Secrets and Stars
by Fib1123581321
Summary: Lily Luna Potter and Lysander Scamander are both young, both talented, and both broken. As they struggle with and bond through Quidditch and grief, Lily grows reckless and Lysander must attempt to pick up the pieces. After all, he wants to be the stars that guide her, not the moon she howls at.
1. Lupus

**Note: **To all my faithful readers and newcomers, I'm back! I have been on a fan-fiction hiatus for over six months now, but I just couldn't get this story out of my head and would keep writing/planning it, so here it is: the first chapter of 'Secrets and Stars,' a Lily/Lysander HP fic canon to my next gen. story, 'Blood of the Birds' (though you'll understand it just fine even if you haven't read BotB). It is set a month after BotB ends (not including the epilogue) and follows both 16 year-old Lily (sixth year at Hogwarts) and 19 year-old Lysander (professional Beater for the Montrose Magpies Quidditch team) as they grapple with grief and are constantly drawn together.

This fic will be quite different from BotB, more character-driven rather than plot and with storylines that are (in my opinion) more grave and grown-up. That being said, you'll see some familiar faces throughout, and hopefully my writing will contain the same voice it always has. I hope you enjoy the first chapter, and of course, this universe and all its settings/characters belong to the wonderful JK Rowling.

-Hailey

* * *

**1 – Lupus**

She hurt. Breathing hurt. Standing hurt. Remembering... remembering hurt harder.

Lily took another swig from the flask he had given her and that she had filled in Hogsmeade last night. It burned, but fire was a pain she could handle. The train of fire that currently hung long around her face had been her constant companion for fifteen years. It was only in her most recent year that she had grown recognizable in other ways. She hadn't wished for the scars, but then she hadn't wished for most of what had come to her this year.

"Cheers, James," she said.

There was no response. Not even the dirt from her brother's grave stirred. There was a plaque there too, lying flat against the ground, with his name written in bold, capitalized letters, followed by the nearly twenty years of his life summed up in a single, short horizontal line. Below that the carved stone read, _Talented flier. Brave son. Big brother. Best friend._ Apparently, he had played four roles in his life. Lily had known all four, so she must have known all of him, right?

One more swig couldn't hurt.

Stuffing the flask into her knee pads, she turned around to open the chest of practice balls. For now, the Bludgers would remain chained, but she bounced the familiar Quaffle around a few times to get her own bearings, and then she opened a compartment that revealed a shining, gold ball the size of a walnut. She had never held a Snitch before, even a practice one. She reminded herself that James hadn't held this one, that he'd been buried with every one he'd ever caught, but that didn't help. Holding that ball in her hands and watching it spread its silver wings was like holding that dash line from his grave, only this actually meant something. Only this actually was a part of him, maybe even all of him.

"Hey, I got all the Keeper pads," said someone behind her. The voice was followed by a loud thump on the grass and a relieved, boyish sigh.

"Good," she said, standing, the Snitch still trying to escape her grasp. Facing Fred Weasley, her cousin and sub-captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, Lily saw behind him a few small figures walking toward them from the castle. "And it looks like you're just in time."

Fred followed her gaze to take in the rest of the team, from his younger sister Roxanne to his new fellow Beater, fourth year number nerd Jackson Smith, whose eyes were lighter than his ghostly skin. Lily had had no say in Jackson's success during try-outs; she'd been too busy finding a new Seeker.

The new and returning players were halfway across the pitch when Lily looked to her sub-captain and asked, "You mind if we split up today?"

"Not at all," said Fred, "Do what you need to do. I'll take Jackson and Roxy can train the others."

Lily nodded but did not smile. She picked up her Firebolt and walked straight into the pack of Gryffindors, yanking the skinny arm of a young brunette in the opposite direction and pulling the girl outside the pitch perimeter. Lily was grasping hard, her fingers indenting the girl's soft skin, waiting for her to snatch her hand away.

"Er, you might want to watch out," said the girl after a few minutes, during which Lily had pressed even harder as she trudged up the hill. The Whomping Willow, as silent yet deadly as ever, stood in front of her. The end of its branches all blended together into a giant fist in Lily's vision.

Blinking until the branches separated, Lily said, "Sorry. I was waiting for you to fight back. You have to be aggressive in Quidditch."

"Funny," the girl laughed, her lips curling into a crooked smile that reminded Lily of secrets. "I was waiting for it to hurt."

Lily narrowed her eyes and mounted her broom, the girl following suit. The Snitch she'd been gripping in her free hand was released and the two girls simultaneously pushed off the ground.

A trail of gold whizzed down toward Hagrid's Hut, where the Snitch flew through an open window by the pumpkin patch and out the other side. Lily hesitated at the window before turning her broom up and flying overhead, the girl with an oversized practice jersey racing ahead toward the Black Lake.

It was late afternoon and Lily could just make out the moon's reflection on the water spread ahead of her. It would be full tonight. What Lily couldn't see was the Snitch, so instead she followed the girl, whose posture was prim and proper atop her broom, not at all wild or carefree like Lily's had been called. "Back straight, make a forty-five degree angle with the broom," Madam Katie Bell had always said in Lily's first-year flying classes. That wasn't the first time Lily had been accused of failing to listen.

The girl had just passed above the incoming tide. Lily was still a few yards behind but was accelerating quickly. She planned to use the lake's free current to push her under and ahead of the girl, but she never made it to the water. Her eyes glanced away from the girl for a second and she was staring at the clearing by the shore. With one blink the water had turned to ice and the sand to snow, and there were flashes of green shining from every direction: Hogsmeade to the east, the Forbidden Forest to the west, Hogwarts to the north. By the water was a small bird with a sharp beak and a ghastly squawk. It was a blue jay, and as it flew for Lily and nipped at her shoulder, Lily's teeth started to sharpen and she growled at the bird. The bird didn't dare retreat, and as its beak poked Lily's scars she returned the favor in a green flash before toppling into the water.

Her eyes opened to the chilling liquid, searching frantically for light. Lily was grateful to see that the ice she had envisioned was not a reality, so she surfaced easily and gasped for air. Grabbing her soaked broom, she began to paddle back to the shore. She was surprised to see the girl waiting for her on the beach, in the same spot James's best mate had once stood upon saving Lily from the water's pull.

"Decided to take a swim?" asked the girl, though all Lily could focus on was the Snitch resting peacefully in the girl's hand.

"You caught it," said Lily. "Good."

Lily's knees buckled and she fell forward, staring at her hands half-buried in the cold sand. The hands were familiar – large, pale, dry – but one of her thumbs looked like a claw.

The girl had moved to Lily's level and was reaching out to her, saying, "Maybe you need to—"

"I _don't_ need to go to the hospital wing!" Lily spat at her, looking up.

The girl rolled her eyes. "I wasn't going to suggest that. I was going to say that maybe you should loosen up." Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out a black polished flask that looked a bit like the one inside Lily's jacket. "This might help."

Lily was skeptical. This girl didn't know her; she didn't know how to help.

When Lily didn't take the flask, the girl opened it and took a swig, keeping a completely straight face as she did so. Then she looked past Lily and toward the water, pointed at something and said, "See that island there? The one right in the middle of the lake. That's where my parents were killed."

Lily didn't need to turn around to know which island the girl was talking about. There was only one piece of land on the lake, and to some it had been an oasis; Lily's own cousin had married there last month. But oases were still deserts. They still cracked.

Without another word, Lily took the flask straight out of the girl's hand and grimaced as the clean taste of vodka raged down her throat.

After Lily had taken three sips, the girl stood up, extended her hand, and said, "Kenna Meyer. I don't believe you ever actually asked for my name at try-outs."

Lily took her hand. "Welcome to the team, Kenna."

* * *

Lysander scanned the empty room. Only the walls held any last piece of his late roommate, thanks to the permanent sticking charms James had put on his hangings. Peeling cream-colored paint, Gryffindor banner remnants, battle plans, corner. Montrose Magpies jersey number, creaky bed frame, fogged window, corner. Post-breakup infused hole, butterbeer stain, Rose's picture, corner. Box, door, Lysander, corner.

James's brothers Teddy and Al had come to clear out his things a few days earlier. That had been the first time since James's death that Lysander had stepped foot inside the room; maybe now would be his last. He took one final look, picked up the box of things Teddy and Al had let him keep for himself, and shut the door behind him.

Quidditch practice started ten minutes ago, so Lysander quickly slid the box under his own bed, grabbed a slice of week-old bread off the kitchen counter, and left. The flat was above the Woolworths on High Street, right in the center of town, and he had to walk ten blocks to the Quidditch pitch that was well-hidden amidst the muggle Golf Links. He crossed the street at the corner of High and John, heading down John between the Bank of Scotland and a restaurant with the words "The Creel Seafoods" written in Greek colors above its browning windows. Last year James had discovered that the restaurant was actually a wizarding bar called The Meyer Lemon, disguised with the smell of rotting fish to keep the muggles out. Ironically, the smell had also kept Lysander out.

John Street was narrow, which Lysander appreciated. Less space meant fewer people, and fewer people meant fewer smiles to exchange. Montrose was the type of place where everyone smiled at each other, even if they were strangers. Lysander didn't much want to smile at strangers when he could no longer smile to his friends.

He jogged past most of the residential neighborhoods, including the houses near the council chamber building where Hattie Cavendish waved from the front door. Lysander ignored her. He went straight through Union Row, with the football club on one side and the rugby club on the other; he'd never understood why muggles needed so many different sports to play. If sports were about spirit and unity, wouldn't it make more sense to just have one that the whole world could rally around? That was what Quidditch was for the wizards, what it used to be for him.

On Whinfield Road he sprinted the final leg onto the golf course. As soon as his feet touched the green, a stadium bigger than the football and rugby clubs combined appeared before his eyes. Lysander headed straight into the locker room, where he deposited his gym bag and scanned the bulletin board for announcements. Next to the season's match schedule was posted an advertisement that read, "Roommate wanted. Empty bedroom. Good size," above a picture that moved through the entryway and into his village flat.

"I'll take the room if no one's snatched it yet," said a voice from behind Lysander.

He turned around to find a bleach-blonde broad lacing her shoes on the changing bench. Apparently Lysander wasn't the only one who was late today. Harper Frye was the only female on the Montrose Magpies Quidditch team; she'd played Chaser for the past two years.

"Oh, and what's so bad about where you live now?" Lysander asked her.

"Nothing," Harper shrugged. "Just can't afford it. What's wrong with yours?"

"Nothing. I guess it's just more of a guys' place – you know, like a bachelor pad." He smirked.

"Huh," said Harper as she stood up and walked toward Lysander, who was hovering by to the broom stand. "Sounds oddly familiar."

She turned away from him, grabbed her broomstick and started to walk out. Before she made it to the door, though, Harper waved her broom in the air and shouted back at Lysander, "When I move in, be sure to never refer to our home as a _bachelor pad _again, else I might just stick a few of these up your _thick_ arse!" Her temper was about as short as her hair.

Reluctantly, Lysander followed Harper outside and onto the pitch, where Liam Hardy, the team captain known due to his stocky stature as the Bear, was drilling the other two Chasers, watching them hit red Quaffles into the hoops that were being defended by Keeper Pierre Tottingham. Liam was a Beater like Lysander, only he was a much better one than Lysander would ever be. Every wizard in the country was waiting to see the Bear be drafted for the Quidditch World Cup, but one of the Chasers had told Lysander that Liam hadn't even tried out for the British team for the last championship back in 2022.

"Eight, Twenty-one, you're late!" yelled Liam without even looking in the direction of Harper and Lysander.

Harper said nothing. She wasn't afraid of anyone, but for as long as Lysander had known her she'd never spoken a word to their captain. Liam seemed to expect the silence, looking only to Lysander for a response as Harper inched past them, caught a Quaffle that was plummeting for the grass, and hit it straight through the right-side hoop.

"Sorry," Lysander mumbled while securing his elbow pads.

Liam harrumphed and said, "You know, I'm getting quite tired of hearing that from you. I gave you time, Twenty-one, but your time's up." His arms were crossed and his muscles bulged out of them like popcorn.

"It won't happen again." But it probably would.

Liam ignored him, clapping his hands and calling the team to a huddle back on the ground. The Chasers – Harper, Liam's right-hand man Henry Cavendish, and an American recruit named Grady Sutter – came in a pack, with Pierre lagging behind in his heavily padded practice uniform.

"All right, now that everyone's actually present," Liam started, "I can inform you that McLeod will be stopping by any minute now with our new Seeker."

Everyone's faces dropped, and half of them looked at Lysander. The season had started two months ago and no one had said a thing about the eventual replacement of James's old position. Lysander tried to keep a straight face as Liam said, "McLeod and I have seen him fly and he's faster than any Seeker in the UK. As far as I'm concerned, he's already on the team."

"Well, what about how he plays with the rest of us?" asked Pierre, whose incredible height and dark skin weren't even intimidating once anyone got to know him.

"He's a Seeker, Three," said Liam. "He plays alone."

Lysander could feel Pierre's black eyes on him; James had never played alone.

"Oh, who cares about that!" said Grady, Pierre's best mate. "He's, like, a recruit, right? Who is he? Where's he from?"

The Magpies were professional Quidditch players; knowing their strongest opponents from around the world was part of their job description. "He's from Germany," said Liam. "His name is-"

"ERICK LUDVIG," said a thickly-accented voice from behind Lysander. He turned around to see the Magpies manager, Carl McLeod, coming from the locker room alongside a much younger man with a layer of brown scruff hanging from his chiselled chin and bushy eyebrows that swallowed intensely focused eyes.

"The Lazer," said Grady in utter awe.

Erick "Lazer" Ludwig played for the Heidelberg Harriers, a team fiercer than a dragon and twice as clever. He'd been recruited as a starter straight out of wizarding school five years ago, and he'd caught the Snitch for the German National team at the 2022 World Cup, winning the championship for his country and leaving the United States in the dust.

"How can we afford him?" Henry asked Liam as Erick slowly approached, his every step firm, purposeful, calculated. "We didn't even trade anyone."

Liam didn't answer, but gave Henry a look that said, _I'll tell you later._ Which meant that Liam didn't want the team to know, or, as Lysander's Ravenclaw wit urged him not to overlook, _Erick _didn't want them to know.

Erick and McLeod were with the rest of them now, the latter patting Erick's shoulder until Lazer shrugged him off and saying, "I suppose Mister Ludwig needs no introduction. Assuming all goes well, his new position will be revealed at the Falcons match next month."

Grady looked like a puppy whose master just came home from a week's vacation. The rest of the team was not so thrilled about the news, or perhaps they were just more loyal than the American. Pierre and Harper were crossing their arms and scowling, which Lysander appreciated since he wasn't sure what to do with himself.

That was until McLeod raised a hand that Lysander hadn't noticed was holding a fresh jersey and gave it to Erick, shaking simultaneously with his free hand. Erick unfolded the shirt as Liam extended his hand to shake and said, "Welcome to the team."

"_Danke_," said Erick, pulling the shirt over his head, the number seven plastered across his chest. Erick looked down at his hand, which was still locked in Liam's, and gestured for the captain to let go, but everyone was still… everyone but Lysander.

He lunged forward without thinking, anger sizzling through his body in the exact wrong direction. He felt it in his extremities first, his toes allowing him to balance and his fingers grabbing hold of the jersey's collar and attempting to pull it off Erick's head. As the shirt ruffled against Erick's pectorals but was blocked by his shoulders, the feeling seeped through the same part of Lysander's body, and he finally felt it in his core when multiple pairs of hands pulled him off his new teammate. Pierre and Grady were strong on their own, even stronger combined, but Lysander put up a good fight, thrashing persistently until he was on the ground and had nothing to thrash at but the pitch itself.

"_WHAT THE BLOODY HELL IS GOING ON?"_ yelled McLeod, not waiting for an answer before he turned to Erick and apologized for his player's behavior. "I am so sorry; Mister Scamander has gone through a great deal this past year and is still overcoming his anger management issues."

Lysander scoffed from the grass, where he was lying on his back and wriggling against the heavy hands of Pierre and Grady. "Just take it off!" he said through gritted teeth and fierce green eyes, confusing McLeod even more. McLeod had no idea what Lysander had been through this year, because his anger had been well managed through all of it. Until now, anyway.

McLeod looked at Erick bewildered, but Erick was looking down at the number and was beginning to understand. The rest of the team didn't need an explanation, but Lysander was still surprised to hear Liam's voice come to his defense. Stepping forward, the Bear looked Erick directly in the eyes – both pairs brown but completely different shapes – and said, "There's been a mistake. That number belonged to James Potter. And we do not recycle our players."

"James Potter was-" McLeod started to say, but Erick interrupted him.

"I know," he said, still looking at Liam. James's name was the most famous in the world, but it was his talent he was truly known for. "I understand. I vill take a different numba."

McLeod thanked him and the two shuffled off to the locker rooms to get an old practice jersey for the day. Harper offered her hand to pull Lysander up and patted him on the back once he was still again. Then she turned to Liam for a moment, as if silently communicating something, before returning to her Quaffle. Lysander moved to follow her but was stopped by Liam, who pushed him slightly and said, "Take the day off, Twenty-one."

There was no point in arguing. Lysander grabbed his broom from where he'd dropped it and walked back to the locker room, surprised to find Erick still inside even though he had already found a different jersey to wear, this one with the number five. He had his back to Lysander, but must have heard him as Lysander walked in, because he said, "Do you know if zis has been taken?"

Lysander looked up from his feet and saw that Erick was reading the roommate ad. He didn't much like the idea of Harper moving into James's old room, but after what had happened today, Erick would surely be worse. "Er, yeah, it has actually," he said. "It's my flat. One of the Chasers is moving in."

Erick turned around and bounced his broom in his hand. With a shrug, he said, "Zat is fine. I vill take de couch."

* * *

Lily's eyes burned as she stared into the fire. She was playing the blinking game with herself, and she was winning. The dryness was no longer just a threat to her retinas; it was absolute, like a cold so consuming that it made you wonder if you would ever feel healthy again. Perhaps she would never need to blink. What would happen if she simply kept her eyes open? Would they burst into flames? That would be an exciting development. Would they go blind? At least then she wouldn't have to see a world without him. Or would they just continue to burn, serving as a constant reminder of the pain of life, of deciding to live, of continuing? The idea reminded Lily of grief.

"Hey, earth to Lil," Hugo's voice woke her from her reverie.

"_What?"_ she asked testily, hating him for making her blink, hating him for pulling her from such a brilliant distraction.

"Squirmsnail asked you something," said Hugo, "and you don't get to ignore him anymore."

Lily looked back at the fire, which was roaring inside the Gryffindor common room. Between two flames was the image of an appositely orange head, covered in spots that were something of a mix between youthful freckles and old age marks. Nigel Creevey, like Kenna and so many other young people, had lost his parents in the war. Before that he'd just been a normal kid wizard – going to Hogwarts, dealing with bullying friends, and falling in love. He'd since dropped out of school to study wandlore, but he and his boyfriend liked to chat via Flu powder nearly every night. Lily found it rather vomit-inducing, but she indulged them nonetheless. She owed them that.

"Sorry, Nigel," she said. "What did you say?"

Luckily, Nigel was quick to forgive. "Oh, I just asked how Quidditch was going… no injuries yet, I hope?"

Nigel had been a Beater on the team for one season, and he'd been bloody good at it, too, in the most literal sense. The violence he'd brought had helped Gryffindor win many a match, but it had also given Nigel too much guilt to continue with the sport.

Lily thought back on today's practice and almost answered yes, for herself, but instead said, "No. Everything's great. I'm training a new Seeker and Roxy's helping with Bert and the new Keeper."

"Yeah!" said Roxanne upon hearing her name, interrupting just when Lily hoped she would. "Olivia's great. She's so small, but her agility really helps her block. She can get from the low hoop to the high hoop in less than a second!"

Once Roxanne and Nigel were deep in discussion, Lily tuned them out and pulled herself onto the sofa she'd been leaning on from the floor. Its fabric was crimson red and velvet soft, and she liked to think it acted as her camouflage. No one could find her or touch her here, not in Gryffindor Tower where the birds sang and the lions roared.

Lily could just barely see the west-facing window, over by the spiral staircases that led to her dormitory. The sun had nearly set, and soon the moon would take its place. She wondered what it had in store for her tonight.

She was still gazing at the window when Kenna came hopping down the stairs, catching Lily's eye and making her way over. Kenna too was agile, her feet pointed like a ballerina as she skipped comfortably through groups of rowdy Gryffindors without stepping over a single toe. She was at the sofa quickly, bouncing over the cushion and sitting beside Lily. She took one glance at Lily's three friends, known to most as the Gryff Group, laughed at their cheerfulness, and whispered to Lily, "Want to get out of here? _Excite_ the flames, so to speak?"

Confused, Lily searched Kenna's uniform and set her sights on the flask Kenna was slyly pulling out from under her skirt. Suddenly Lily felt as though her eyes were burning again, and this time she knew that an explosion was their only potential fate. She nodded.

The two girls were off the sofa and halfway out the door when Roxy yelled after them, "Lily, where are you going?"

"Out," Lily shrugged. "We're sixth year now, Roxy. We don't have stupid curfews anymore!"

Roxanne gave Hugo a concerned look and Hugo, ever the logical one, said carefully, "Lily, are you sure it's the best idea for you to go out tonight? Sounds a bit ill-advised to me, considering the circumstances."

Lily scoffed, but it sounded like a growl. "What does, living?" she asked, adding, "You're probably right," and walking out of the tower.

She felt freer as she and Kenna stood in the middle of the seventh floor landing. No other students were around, and the castle was quiet with possibility. It reminded Lily of when she used to sneak out at night and escape from the world, from her name, from responsibility, from time.

After assessing that the coast was clear, Kenna took out her flask and offered it to Lily, who noticed that it had been refilled since that morning. Lily took a swig and asked, "Where do you get your supply from?"

"My sister's a bartender," Kenna answered. "How d'you feel about heights?"

Lily furrowed her eyebrows but said, "They're great, I suppose. Why?"

Kenna smiled, and it made her bug eyes squint in the corners, almost like she was winking. When Kenna started running down the stairs, Lily didn't hesitate to follow.

They ran all the way to the ground floor and didn't see a soul; Lily had a theory that most students had grown fearful since the war, herself included. Much of the castle had been rebuilt since its destruction last May, and it was about time somebody made a mark on its fresh marble.

Lily had her sights set on the giant double doors that opened out of the Great Hall, so she was caught off guard when Kenna spun around and started the long ascent up the Astronomy Tower. This time it was harder for Lily to follow her.

The tower was technically closed off outside class hours, but that wasn't what was stopping Lily. She had specifically opted out of taking Astronomy this year because of what that tower had meant to James.

"What is it?" Kenna asked, noticing Lily's frozen posture behind her.

_Don't say anything, _Lily thought, _just go._ But her feet wouldn't move. Frustrated, she sighed and said, "My brother used to go up there."

"Oh, right," Kenna nodded. "Him and his friend, the blond bloke-"

"Lysander. Lysander Scamander."

"Yes, that's the one!" Kenna was snapping her fingers like she'd just won a game. "He was quite fit, wasn't he?"

At first, Lily wanted to roll her eyes at Kenna. This wasn't about Lysander, this was about James, her _dead _brother… but then she thought, _was it really? _Not everything had been about James when he'd been alive, especially the Astronomy Tower, which had been Lysander's look-out before James had started using it to spy on other Quidditch teams. Why should everything be about him now that he was dead?

"Yeah," Lily laughed, walking past Kenna and onto the stairwell. "You should see him now."

"Ohhh," said Kenna, "I'd like to."

"He, er, gave me my flask actually," Lily said. "Back before the battle, at the Longbottom wedding."

"Oh, speaking of which, is it true you actually _fought _in the battle?"

Most young witches and wizards had been instructed to stay home when the battle began, but those who'd attended the wedding hadn't had anywhere else to go. "Yeah, I did," said Lily, taking another swig from Kenna's flask. "But it's not the most exciting story. Other people were fighting dragons and storming the castle. I spent most of the night running." She wasn't trying to be modest; she just didn't want to tell Kenna the whole truth: that she'd killed someone and almost killed herself, and would have had Lysander not jumped into the freezing Black Lake to save her.

Kenna was pensive for about ten steps until she muttered feebly, "I wonder what my parents were doing."

They didn't speak again until they reached the top of the tower, and both were out of breath by then anyway. The platform that overlooked the grounds was closed off by a red rope, much like the restricted section in the library, but just to be safe Lily used a Revealing Charm to see if it had any spells on it. It didn't, so they passed easily.

Leaning over the railing, Lily could see almost all of Hogwarts: the Black Lake with its island oasis, the Forbidden Forest with Hagrid's Hut, and the Quidditch pitch with its stadium lights. It looked so small from here, yet it meant a great deal to so many people – not just Lily's brother James, but her late grandfather too, and her parents. Even after James had died, she hadn't considered the idea of quitting. Quidditch was in her blood.

Above the pitch, the moon was beginning to rise through thick gray clouds, and something deep inside Lily was drawn to it, like animals to shiny objects. She craved the night, waited for it, wished for it. What she dreaded was the morning that followed.

Knowing she only had so much time, Lily looked at Kenna and asked, "So, what are we doing here?"

Kenna leaned half her body over the railing, taking in the view of the courtyard directly below. Then she straightened herself, held up the flask, and said, "First, we drink. Then, we jump."

"_Jump?"_ asked Lily, taking a step back. The tower was the tallest in all of Hogwarts, at least fifteen stories up from the ground.

"Loosen up, will you?" Kenna laughed. "We're not trying to kill ourselves. Before you go, just use a Summoning Charm to call for your broom, and then see how far you get before you land on it and fly off. Perfectly safe."

Lily was skeptical, but she tried not to show it. "So, you've done this before?"

"Loads of times. Ever since my parents died, it's been harder to get any sort of adrenaline rush, but trust me, this'll do it."

Lily took a deep breath, not daring to look down again. "Okay, then," she said, holding up her own empty flask for Kenna to fill. "Hit me."

"_Accio _death," said Kenna.

"_Accio _death," said Lily, clinking their flasks together.

They raced to down their drinks and Kenna won by a millisecond, which only made Lily more ready to impress as they faced their impending doom. Simultaneously summoning their respective Firebolts, Lily and Kenna climbed atop the railing and counted down from five. On five, they looked at each other. On four, they looked down. On three, they heard a shout from the platform and were startled but not stopped. On two, they shut their eyes. On one, they jumped.

The echoing yells of Lily's father Harry, the current Headmaster of Hogwarts, could just barely be heard above her screams as she fell feet-first toward the hard ground. She knew why he wanted to stop her, and it wasn't because she was breaking the rules, so she decided to ignore him. She decided to feel.

For the first time since Christmas, she let in every emotion that came her way: fear, excitement, anticipation, darkness, and for a brief moment, light.

And then it was over, and she was back on her broom, her legs instinctively straddling it before her mind had time to think of what to do. She leaned forward and zoomed toward the forest, glancing back to make sure Kenna had made it. She was right on her tail. As if to get her off it the way any good Seeker would, Lily pulled her whole body down to the broom and accelerated until she was turning around trunks and under branches.

The moonlight scattered across the forest floor like snowflakes, and they grew larger as Lily passed them, so she must be getting closer. She followed them until they were one full circle of white and she leaped off her broom and into the clearing. It had been a girl riding the broomstick, but it was a wolf that touched the ground. It was a wolf that howled at the moon. It was a wolf that ran off, bursting into flames, exploding into the night.

* * *

"Okay, pivot a bit here," said Harper near the top of the stairs. Lysander and Erick were halfway up the flight, holding the corners of an enormous armoire that Harper insisted on putting in her new bedroom.

Lysander grunted and Erick shoved himself and the armoire into the wall so that they could turn it around the corner. "Might I remind you that the move could have waited till morning!" Lysander said. It must have been honing in on 3AM; his two new flatmates had taken most of the evening to pack and had been hauling their things into the apartment for the past four hours. They hadn't even signed the lease yet.

"Yes, well, I've never been one to take things slow," said Harper as the boys made one final push and set the armoire down on the second floor landing.

"Noted," said Lysander, his head poking out from behind the piece of furniture.

"Oh, shut it," Harper said. "You're such a pig!"

"Focus, people!" Erick's stern voice came out of nowhere, his German grunt sounding even grittier with his throat dry from the move. "Zis is the last of eet!"

Lysander wished he was more annoyed, but there was something oddly charming about Lazer's determination. For a moment, just a moment, he reminded Lysander of James.

The trio all shared looks and nodded, ready for the final stretch. Together, they pulled and pushed the armoire through the hall, over the threshold, past the open kitchen and living room that would soon belong to Erick, and turned another corner to get into Harper's room. Lysander was careful not to push past this second threshold, having promised himself that he wouldn't step foot in there again.

"You got it from here?" he asked Harper.

"Yup, I'm all set. Thanks!"

Lysander and Erick turned back and headed into the kitchen, Erick veering off to unpack a suitcase full of books onto an empty shelf above the grimy fireplace. Lysander rummaged through the fridge to find an old pizza and swallowed the last two slices.

"Is zis important, or should I dispose of it?" asked Erick, holding something Lysander couldn't quite see.

Walking over to get a better look, Lysander took the book from Erick's hand. It was vaguely familiar, with fur along its binding and odd spots on its cover that looked eerily similar to a pair of eyes. Remembering something about stroking the binding, Lysander petted the fur and opened the book to read the title on its first page: _Monster Book of Monsters: Care of Magical Creatures, Year Three. _Below that was a small signature in perfect cursive, and Lysander thought he might literally break apart as he read the name: Lorcan Scamander.

Not thinking, no longer _able _to think, Lysander didn't say anything to Erick before he shut the book gingerly, sprinted to his room, took out the box that he was storing beside the one full of James's things, and set the book inside, next to a skinny red tie that Lysander had stolen off his twin brother's corpse the night he'd been killed.

Lysander stared at the two items, hoping that his heartbeat would stop racing, but it didn't. It kept going, thumping against his chest like Bludgers in a trunk, and then he couldn't breathe. Everything was tightening around him, from his veins to his ribs to the walls of his own home. He needed to get out.

He managed to run out of the flat without catching Harper's attention, and if Erick saw him he mustn't have cared, because he didn't follow either. Lysander still couldn't breathe as he jogged through the streets, but it didn't matter because he also couldn't think. And if he couldn't think, he couldn't order himself to stop moving.

His legs brought him to the harbor, but they did not take him onto the docks or into any of the houseboats that sat there. They marched right past a little girl who was dipping her toes in the Atlantic water and headed for the nearby lighthouse, and Lysander still wasn't thinking as his right hand flicked a wand at the lock and opened the door without any incantation. Then he was climbing steps all the way to the top, and as he climbed, his blood started to rush through the rest of his body like it was supposed to. He was breathing again – panting like a dog on every step, but breathing nonetheless.

When he reached the top, Lysander was reminded of the Astronomy Tower at Hogwarts where he'd spent so many hours during his school years and where he'd gone after discovering the deaths of both James and Lorcan… his brothers. He suspected he'd just experienced a panic attack, and the height was the only thing that had managed to calm him.

He liked having a view of everything: the harbor on his left with that little girl who was now staring up at him curiously, the night sky above from which the moon was disappearing, and the beach right below the Lupus constellation that was meant to look like a wolf. The beach was peaceful, the waves washing the sand in and out, in and out, dragging sea glass and mussel shells and driftwood with it and then delivering it all once more. Along the beach, a few gulls were beginning their morning search for crabs and clams, and someone was sleeping amongst a flock of them, her red hair buried in the sand.

Someone was sleeping on the beach? _No, that couldn't be right_, thought Lysander, squinting his eyes to gain a better look. Red hair? _Oh no, not her._

He rushed back down the steps, not bothering to lock the door behind him, and ran along the beach until he fell to his knees at her head. Just as he'd suspected, it was Lily Potter, unconscious and beaten to a pulp by whatever she'd run into that night as a werewolf. She'd shown up in Montrose during a full moon before, late last year when she'd tracked James's scent all the way here from Hogwarts. Lysander suspected the same thing had happened now.

"Lily?" he said. "Lily?"

She didn't respond, and her heartbeat was faint, too faint. She couldn't have transformed very long ago, though, so Lysander tried not to worry. Last time it had taken her hours to wake up.

He hoisted her into his arms and carried her into town and up to the flat, where Erick rushed to make a temporary spot on the kitchen counter on which Lysander could lay her down.

"Who is she?" Erick asked worriedly.

"Lily Potter. James's little sister." The last time this had happened, James had been here, and Lorcan too.

Shaking his head to get that image out of his mind, Lysander inspected Lily for her largest wounds and started to magically mend her cuts and bruises. He was feeling for broken ribs when Harper strolled in from the hallway, having heard the raucous and come out to see what was going on.

"Good lord," she said upon seeing Lily. She must have recognized her; Lily's face had been in the _Daily Prophet _plenty of times, and her mother Ginny's similar features could be found in the author's box of the Quidditch column every week.

Lysander didn't stop his inspection, but he also didn't protest when Harper shoved Erick out of the way and put her ear to Lily's mouth. Erick was too confused to ask questions, but Lysander dreaded the idea of telling Harper that Lily was a werewolf. The information wasn't exactly undisclosed, but it was private.

He was waiting for her to ask what had happened, but she never did. Instead, she stood back up and looked at Lysander as if she understood, and for a split second Lysander thought perhaps she did. But then Harper said, "She's drunk. I can smell the alcohol coming from her pores."

Perfect. Pretending that was all that was wrong with Lily, Lysander nodded and said, "Don't worry. I've got this." Then he picked her up once more and took her into his bedroom, shutting the door and placing her in the middle of his bed. He covered her with James's Gryffindor blanket and took his Ravenclaw one for himself, curling up into a chair facing Lily and the bed and watching her soft breathing as he fell asleep.

He woke when she did, sometime later. She grunted and her eyes opened with his, and after Lily looked around and figured out where she was she started to wince and opened her mouth in a desperate attempt to say something, but words were too painful, too difficult to form.

"Shh, it's okay," said Lysander, leaning forward and pulling the blanket up around her bare shoulders. She looked back at him, her eyes wide with fright and her hair a radio of static on the pillow. She was gulping for air when he said again, "You're okay. You're not alone. I hurt too."

* * *

**Note: **What did you think? Please leave a review and let me know; all feedback is appreciated, especially constructive criticism and questions about the story (I'll give spoilers if you want them), and I'll reply to every one I can. I'm not sure what my updating schedule will be like for this fic yet since I'm waiting to see what the response to this chapter is like, but if you like what you read and say so in a review, I'd be happy to keep you in the loop on the update timeline.

If I do continue the story, the next chapter will be called 'Gemini,' so you can probably guess that it will focus on Lysander and the loss of his twin brother, Lorcan.

Thanks so much for reading! It feels good to be back; I missed you all :)

-Hailey


	2. Gemini

_**Note: **Thank you so much for your kind reviews on the last chapter! I wasn't sure about continuing this story, but I had so much fun writing it and you seemed to enjoy it, so I think I'll keep going as long as I can. :) _

_This chapter is substantially longer than the last, so my apologies if you're not a fan of long chapters (I didn't picture it being this long; just sort of ended up that way). Hope you like it!_

_-Hailey_

* * *

**2 – Gemini **

Lysander had a theory that people, magical and Muggles alike, _felt _more at night. It was a human's instinct to fear darkness, to fear the unknown, and so the human body was more aware when darkness fell. Eyes worked harder to see mere outlines of the world, legs tensed in preparation of needed escape, and adrenaline was aplenty. And then there was, of course, the romance of it all. Anything could happen under the stars. People bore their souls to each other at night, because it was always easier to be naked in only one way at once, and at night the exterior hid and the interior shone. Night was just as powerful as light, just as necessary to the world… possibly even more. Lysander hated it.

Three nights a week, the Magpies all ran together as one through the streets and outskirts of Montrose, as if training for an amoeba marathon. Liam claimed that it made them a more cohesive unit, forcing them to trust as they barrelled down the moonlit roads and could see nothing but each other. They took turns leading along the twenty-kilometer route, changing pace depending on the player in front. Lysander had just finished his section and had been replaced with Henry, and he appreciated being part of the group again. When he was on his own, his nerves tingled and memories simmered behind his forehead like flies buzzing around a light bulb.

"You were the fastest yet," said Harper between breaths beside him.

Lysander hadn't noticed before, but now he realized they were slowing down. "I'm not that fast," he said, even though he was the tallest on the team, standing comfortably above six feet. He hadn't felt fast in a long time.

"You all right?" asked Harper when he didn't continue. Lysander listened to her feet thump atop the softly sinking river road. For every one of his thumps, she made two.

He looked in her direction but could only see the white reflection of her hair. "Yeah," he shrugged.

Only Liam and Henry were in front of them, and half a kilometer later the two captains whispered something to each other and then turned around, running backward to face the rest of the team.

"Vatch out for zat car!" yelled Erick behind Harper.

Lysander could just barely hear Grady mutter under his breath to Pierre, "See, the guy has supernatural night vision!" No one else could spot even the car's headlights for another two minutes.

"Thanks Five," said Liam. Addressing the group, he explained, "All right, we're going to do things a bit differently tonight. Two has proposed that we sprint these last five k."

"What's that, like half a mile?" asked Grady.

"Not even close," Harper spat at him, and Lysander didn't need to see her to know she was rolling her watery blue eyes.

Dodging a honking sedan and flipping it off, Henry said, "Finish line is the Meyer Lemon. Last one there buys."

"When do we start?" asked Pierre, but Henry and Liam had already turned forward and were speeding up.

Lysander looked back and answered, "I think we already started," before going after the captains.

He left Harper, Grady, and Pierre in the dust, but Erick was quick on Lysander's tail. Still, Lysander knew that Mister Lazerbeam was faster in the air than he was on land, and for Lysander it was the opposite. They were coming up on the mouth of River Southesk and Erick asked, "Is zer any shortcut?"

Lysander laughed. "Sure," he said. "Acceleration."

Erick's presence was the catalyst for Lysander, and before he knew it his legs were barely touching the ground as he turned onto the main road that led into town. A few meters ahead of him, the silhouettes of short-legged Liam and lanky Henry were shining in the oncoming headlights. Lysander caught them in ten seconds, zooming past and ignoring Henry's frustrated growl.

Then he was alone, just like he'd been when he'd been the designated pace-setter, but now it was different. The November air was quickly freezing, but the mixture of adrenaline and exhaustion made him feel only warmth. He could close his eyes without feeling terrified, because he saw just as much with them closed as open, and he willed himself to keep pushing, even through the bubbling blisters on his feet and the throbbing muscles in his calves, by imagining someone running beside him.

Lorcan was his twin brother, his genetic identical. Their feet were the same size, their legs the same length, even their hair the same thickness. When they ran their pace always matched because their bodies did, and if Lysander imagined that Lorcan was beside him, speeding up little by little, then he too would speed up, because he knew that if Lorcan could do it, so could he. And Lorcan had always been fast.

He was racing across the bridge when he felt the wind pick up off the waves of the North Sea. Lorcan used to say that strong winds were made from dragons, their wings flapping as they flew. Lysander could almost taste their fire.

He began to slow as he turned onto High St., and he started walking right as he reached the pub, panting his way through the front door. His knees buckled and his back collapsed toward the floor, so he didn't really see the place until he reached in front of him and his hand copped hold of a stool cushion.

"Oi, you need some water?" asked a female voice with a thick Scottish accent.

Lysander nodded as he straightened back up and was finally able to take in his surroundings. The place was small and dark, but not as grimy as some of the pubs he'd been to in London. On the left side was the bar itself, with a long wooden countertop and backlit shelving. On the right were a few tables under hanging lights equipped with wizards chess boards and a ratty pool table whose cues were floating in the air and hitting balls back and forth, no players necessary. The right wall was covered in pictures of the Montrose Magpies over the years, with one large one in the middle bordered by a tacky golden frame. Lysander didn't need to walk over to know it was the picture from last year's European Championship. The Magpies had won against the Falmouth Falcons, their biggest rivals, and although Lysander hadn't played in the final match because he'd only been a sub at the time, it was one of the best games he'd ever seen. James Potter had caught the Golden Snitch in the middle of a thunderstorm, following the ball straight through one of Pierre's guarded hoops just as that hoop was struck by lightning.

"Here you are," said the same voice as before, making Lysander look back at the counter and take a seat. He had caught his breath by now, and after nodding to the tall brunette he looked down the row and attempted to smile at the old man who was drinking himself to death toward the back end.

In front of Lysander, the sole bartender was washing glasses and giving him a funny look. She was young, mid-twenties at most, and had long brown hair that was straight all the way to her shoulders and then suddenly grew wavy like the frayed end of a smooth rope. Her neck and face were long too, and Lysander felt almost small as he looked over at her, even when she hunched a bit and her hair fell forward to hide her face. She was rather beautiful, but Lysander suspected she hadn't been told that enough in her life.

"I'm sorry," she shook her head at him. "I was completely and openly staring at you. That was very bizarre."

"Er, it's okay," said Lysander, downing his water in one glass.

She refilled it instinctively and started staring at him again, saying, "Have we met before?"

"I dunno', but-" Lysander started, about to explain that he was on the Quidditch team and she'd probably seen him play.

But she interrupted with, "Wait, don't tell me, I'll remember." Then she turned around and poured a large glass of butterbeer before facing Lysander once more, taking a sip from the glass for herself, clapping her hands, pointing a finger at him, and saying, "Lorcan! That's your name! You came in here with James Potter around this time last year."

She posed it as a half-question, so Lysander suspected he may need to confirm. At first, he was going to correct her, but then his lips started working on their own and he said, "Yeah, that's right. I was just visiting him and my brother for the weekend."

The girl nodded, proud of herself. Then her face sunk and she said, "I'm so sorry about James. I've missed him coming here. He was a good lad."

Lysander looked away before asking, "Did you fight in the battle?"

"Aye," she said, filling a bowl of peanuts. "I and my parents. We were in Hogsmeade for most of it, until we split up and…" she paused, unable to continue.

Lysander understood that her parents must not have made it. He knew that look from when it had been on his own face, first for discovering James's body back at the Quidditch pitch, and then for discovering Lorcan's.

The girl changed the subject before Lysander had to, flipping her hair and asking, "What else have you been up to this year? Last time we chatted, I remember you were thinking about proposing to one of the Weasley girls."

Lysander was caught off guard by this, at first thinking of Rose, whom he had dated for a short time at Hogwarts. Then he remembered that the bartender thought he was Lorcan and he said, "Right. Lucy. I did propose actually, but things got sort of complicated after the battle." Complicated because Lorcan died. Complicated because Lucy had blamed Lysander. Complicated because Lysander still wore the engagement ring she'd thrown at him on a string around his neck.

"I'm sorry," said the girl, her voice sincere.

Lysander tried to shake the thought from his head, saying, "No, I'm the sorry one, actually. See, you remembered who I was in an instant, but I can't for the life of me recall _your _name."

The girl grinned, one of her front teeth chipped in the corner. She extended her hand and said, "Evelyn Meyer. Evey."

Lysander was about to say that it was nice to meet her when the door opened and a heap of his teammates piled into the pub, their bodies thrown across each other and their mouths screaming in celebration. It was Erick, Harper, Pierre, and Grady.

"WOOOO!" yelled Grady, the first to stand up straight, his tongue sticking out as he slammed a hand on the counter and said, "Evey, I'd like a round of beers please, _not_ on me."

Evey laughed and went to work filling glasses with beer and solo cups with water. Back at the welcome mat, Erick was pulling Harper up from the floor she'd collapsed on and Pierre had his leg stretched out across the pool table.

"Wait, where's-" Lysander started to ask just as the door opened once more.

A very dishevelled Henry walked in then, his thick black hair sopping wet and falling past his bushy eyebrows, his shirt tight to the skin and dripping water on the wooden floor. A layer of goose bumps covered his bare arms and his teeth chattered as he looked up and said in a rage, "GRADY SUTTER, I AM GOING TO _MURDER_ YOU!"

Grady leaned back from his stool to look around the others and said to Liam, "But after you buy us all drinks, right, you old softie?"

Henry, who _was_ in fact the eldest member of the team but wasn't exactly "soft," harrumphed and headed for the loo. Grady laughed and explained to anyone who would listen that he'd caught up to Henry on the bridge and had very subtly pushed him over the ledge and into the river. "But what about the Bear?" Lysander asked Harper, who was sitting beside him.

"Er," she said, looking down, "he never comes here, so it doesn't count."

It was the first time Lysander had come to the pub because it was his first real season on the team, but for every other Magpie this place was a second home. Lysander was looking at Harper and waiting for her to explain why it wasn't one for Liam when Evey turned around with the drinks, first serving Harper only a water and giving her a knowing look before turning to Erick and Grady. The latter looked up at her and her butterbeer as if staring at an angel and saying, "You like big cups? _I _like big cups! I mean, if that's not fate, I don't know what is."

Everybody burst into laughter then, with the exception of Erick. He was sitting on Harper's other side and leaned forward to address Lysander, reaching out his hand and saying, "Nicely done. I vould like a re-match in the future, Lysander."

Evey was handing Lysander his beer when she heard the name, and she and Lysander made eye contact as she set the drink down. Lysander lowered his head guiltily and said under his breath so that only Evey could hear, "Lorcan was my twin brother." She seemed to understand what had happened upon hearing the word 'was.' Lysander didn't explain further, but he hoped that Evey might also empathize with his decision to impersonate Lorcan. Hopefully she understood, because he bloody well didn't.

* * *

"I've never taken my O.W.L. exams," said Kenna, trying to get Lily to drink.

Her strategy didn't work. When Kenna looked confused by Lily's stillness, Lily explained, "When Hogwarts closed after the battle, the fifth years couldn't take their exams, so we'll be taking them with all of you this May. For now, we just take the NEWT classes we hoped to make it into and will have to wait and see what the results are for next year."

Kenna nodded and said, "Well, that's good, I suppose. Then you can help me study."

"I doubt it," Lily laughed. "_I've _never gotten above Exceeds Expectations in any class in my life."

Kenna looked away as if guilty for something and took a gulp of her lemon drop. They were hiding out in the Astronomy Tower and playing a drinking game Kenna had introduced Lily to. It was past midnight by now, but neither of them was pissed yet.

"All right, if that's how you want to play," said Kenna, "then you should know that I've never conjured a successful Patronus."

Lily thought back on the zebra that she hadn't attempted to produce in some time, drank her minted vodka, and asked, "Didn't you have your class last month?" Every October, the fifth years would have a whole day of Defense Against the Dark Arts to learn the Patronus Charm from two special guest lecturers, ex-Auror and new Headmaster Harry Potter and Head Auror Ron Weasley. Students looked forward to it for years.

"Yeah, but I didn't get it by the end of the day. A lot of people didn't. I think it was the war; it hasn't been that long since everything happened and it's difficult for most of us to think of happy memories these days."

She was probably right, but Lily didn't like that explanation, so she just said, "No, that happens every year. My year, Hugo couldn't get it, plus there's always a few Hufflepuffs who don't."

Kenna looked sombre in the starlight, since Lily could only make out about half her face, the side facing the sky. For a moment, Lily glanced at Kenna and thought she was looking in a mirror. The girls were about the same height, their hair was the same length though very different colors, their noses were both a bit too long but small enough at the nostrils not to be deemed obnoxious, and their cheekbones were sharp and sunken. But it wasn't the lit side of Kenna's face that reminded Lily of her own. It was the other side – the one hidden in shadow.

"Your turn, Lil," Kenna's voice brought Lily's attention back to the game. "And I think it's about time we kick things up a notch."

For a minute, Lily thought through her next move, almost as if she was in the middle of a Quidditch match. Thinking of Quidditch and their upcoming game against Slytherin that would start off the season, Lily changed the rules of the game momentarily and said, "I _have_ vomited from a Bludger hit, have you?"

Kenna rolled back and covered her face with her hands, but didn't drink. When she revealed herself again, her eyes were wide and she was saying between cackles, "I remember that! My second year, Gryffindor versus Hufflepuff, Lorcan Scamander stopped the game to apologize to you!"

"Yes," Lily grimaced, "he was quite the gentleman about it, but that didn't make it any less embarrassing when my innards splashed onto the pitch like a waterfall."

"Well, what didn't end up on the shoulders of one of the Finnigan girls!"

"Hey!" shouted Lily, pointing her finger at Kenna threateningly. "I don't know _what_ you're talking about." In truth, fellow Gryffindor Chaser Caitlin Finnigan had been flying right below to cover for Lily and had received much of the downpour, but Lily had tried very hard to never think of it again.

Her turn to cover her face with her hands, Lily asked desperately, "Can we please move on?"

"Okay, okay," said Kenna. "Lets see, I have puked from drinking, have you?"

Lily drank, remembering a certain wedding from a while back, but she didn't think Kenna's confession had reached the same level of embarrassment as Lily's had. Hoping to learn one of Kenna's secrets for a change, Lily made the first move and said, "I've never been kissed."

Kenna looked surprised, but Lily was even more shocked when Kenna also failed to drink. Unlike Lily, who felt like her life was a waiting period for someone to kiss her, Kenna just shrugged and said, "It'll happen eventually. I'm sure I'll have my first kiss before I die."

There was a time when Lily hadn't been so sure. "But don't you want to?" she asked, curious.

"Of course," said Kenna, drinking even though she didn't have to. "But I don't want to waste my first one. I mean, that's the one I'll supposedly remember forever, so I at least want to like the guy, and I've never been anywhere close to falling in love."

Kenna tucked a strand of silky hair behind her headband and her pearl earrings sparkled. Quietly, almost sheepishly, Lily put her half-empty glass to her lips and sipped. Much to her dismay, Kenna noticed.

"You've been in love?" she asked, and Lily was thankful that Kenna hadn't used the word "think" or "really," like so many others had.

She'd loved Scorpius Malfoy for a good deal of her life, though she couldn't pinpoint when exactly her feelings had started – maybe the summer before her first year at Hogwarts, the first summer Scorpius had spent in Godric's Hollow with Lily's brother Al; maybe her second year, when the look in his eyes had given her the will to race out of a leg-binding jinx Hugo and James had put on her so that she could make it onto the Hogwarts Express; maybe the summer she'd found Scorpius near death in the woods and had nursed him back to health.

"It's funny," said Lily, both to Kenna and to herself. "Everybody knows by now that I was mad crushing on Scorpius all those years, but looking back on it, I can't help but feel like an idiot for not seeing how taken he always was. The first time I met him at King's Cross, he and Rose Weasley were making googly eyes at each other across the platform. The summer Rose had gone travelling, Scorpius had spent weeks writing a single letter to her; he so badly wanted it to be perfect. Even when they weren't technically together yet, they were supposed to be, you know?"

Kenna nodded. "That's the one thing I've always been jealous of," she said. "Having that soul mate, that _person_, who you just know you're meant to spend the rest of your life with. It isn't fair some people find that person so young and then get to spend decades with them while others may only have minutes, or not find them at all. Blimey, I've never even had a best friend."

Lily drank, recognizing that they were back in the game. She was beginning to feel light-headed, but that didn't stop her from noticing the way Kenna's eyes dropped upon seeing her drink.

"Roxanne or Hugo?" Kenna whispered.

"Both, I suppose," said Lily, "but Hugo has Nigel, and that bloody book he's writing, so Roxy if I had to pick. She's naïve, I know, but we've been through a lot together. I think she's the closest I'll ever get to having a sister."

Kenna shivered through her cashmere sweater. It must not have been as thick as Lily's, which her grandmother had hand-knit and embroidered with the letter 'L.' "Anyway," Lily said then, hoping to lighten the mood, "There I go spilling another secret. I don't think I've ever kept one, to be honest."

Lily could see a smile forming on the lit half of Kenna's face. "Funny," said Kenna, "I've never told one."

* * *

The ring was understated and simple, a small diamond at its center and a string of sapphire specks running along its length. It was the only clear, sharp sight in an overtly blurry world, sharper even than the ridiculous suits Lysander and Lorcan were trying on in preparation of their mother's upcoming wedding.

"Look," said Lysander, shutting the box to hide the ring once more and handing it back to his brother, "the ring is perfect, but that's not the problem."

Lorcan sighed and shook his head. Standing from the bed and pacing across Lysander's room while carefully avoiding heaps of dirty Quidditch clothes and crinkled star maps, Lorcan said, "Then what's the problem? Because right now, there's a _werewolf_ lying on the couch in your living room and you just spent three hours nursing her back to health after she probably spent the night killing someone. And the last girl you gave a second glance to was Rose Weasley, who's a whole other story, so tell me, Lysander, why do _you_ get to be so judgmental about _my_ love life?"

Lysander didn't know what Lily had to do with any of this, especially since he'd just been helping her for James's sake, so he ignored that part of Lorcan's speech. Referring to the rest, Lysander said, "I'm not being judgmental, Lor, I'm just concerned. You know, like brotherly concern."

Scoffing, Lorcan asked, "Brotherly concern? You're about to blame this on our twin-sense, aren't you?"

"Yes," said Lysander, shooting his hands in the air, "yes, I am! Because believe it or not, we have a sixth sense about each other."

Lorcan had gone to lean against the opposite wall, the top of his blown-out hair only centimeters from the ceiling, and Lysander was now rummaging through his mess on the floor, in search of something, as he rambled, saying, "You know, I was the one who set you and Lucy up in the first place, so of _course_ I think you're a good couple, and yes, I was slightly surprised to see that you lasted this long, but even that doesn't prove you'll last the rest of your life, and you're both still young, I mean, blimey, she's only seventeen, and I don't want you to get bogged down so soon-"

"Lysander!" Lorcan had his hands on his brother's shoulders and was pulling him up from the floor. "Calm down!"

"Okay, okay," said Lysander, still buzzed from the bizarre night they'd had. He'd finally found the map he'd been searching for, though, so he propped his knee up and flattened the paper against it, then showed it to Lorcan and said, "Just look at this. You remember what constellation this is?"

He was pointing to a cluster of dots that, when connected, formed two distinct human stick figures connected by the hands. "Yeah," said Lorcan, "that's Gemini. The twins."

Lysander nodded. "Correct," he said. "Castor and Pollux. One of them was immortal and one of them wasn't. When the mortal twin died, the immortal twin begged for his brother to be granted immortality like him, and he was. They lived immortal together, but not in life. In the heavens."

Lorcan furrowed his eyebrows. "What are you trying to say?" he asked.

Frustrated, Lysander reminded himself that his brother had been sorted into Hufflepuff for a reason. "I'm saying that right now, you think you're immortal. You think you and Lucy will live happily ever after, but that's not the way life works, even a wizard's life. And right now, the two of you are preparing for a _war_. Why don't you just wait to propose until that war is over? That way, it won't end with one of you begging for the other's immortality."

"You think one of us is going to die?"

"It's a possibility, but no, I don't know. Not even my twin-sense can tell me that."

Lysander woke shaking.

His long limbs had curled themselves into a ball in the corner of his bed, and they ached as he sat up and stretched them forward. Liam had been working the team to its limits this week, and reasonably so, since they'd be playing the Falmouth Falcons the day after tomorrow. It was tradition for the first match of the season to include the two top-ranked teams in the English-Irish league, but Lysander feared that the rankings from last year weren't exactly accurate after everything that the Battle of the Blood had changed.

Lysander tried to stand and winced in pain, but he told himself the pain was good. He could deal with physical pain a whole lot easier than the emotional pain he'd been living lately, which seemed to be crippling him even in sleep. He'd never had trouble sleeping before, but he'd never much liked it either. He didn't like the fact that in order to be awake and see the world and live, he had to be nearly dead half the time.

He was halfway to his door and wiping his sticky eyes when he heard a voice. It was nearby, muffled by the walls, but it was singing, lightly and almost painfully singing,

"_I could swim in the Tenerife Sea,_

_Someplace I know you won't be._

_Maybe then I'll stop dreaming of someday._

_Maybe then I'll start thinking of me."_

Lysander opened the door and entered the hallway, and he could hear a guitar strumming between verses, and then the voice returned and he heard more clearly this time:

"_I could walk along the edge of Lake Toba,_

_Dance on the abyss of our coda,_

_Inside the volcano that wiped out the world._

_May it wipe away the things I never told you."_

Lysander inched across the hall to James's, no, _Harper's_ door, and put his ear against the splintered wood.

"_I could go north to the midnight sun,_

_Try to pretend you weren't the only one._

_But you were my light that never set._

_If I can't move on, I guess I'll just run."_

Lysander exhaled and the door creaked. Knowing he couldn't just back away, he knocked lightly and turned the knob. Thankfully, the room looked nothing like it had when James had lived there. There was a fresh coat of light blue paint on the walls, and posters of a spinning globe and cities that lit up in color. Harper was sitting cross-legged on her bed, which was low to the ground and took up most of the room, an vintage-looking guitar next to her, a piece of parchment in front, and a quill floating by her side.

"Sorry. I didn't wake you, did I?" she said, staring up at Lysander's silhouette in the doorway. A single lamp in the corner farthest from the door lighted the room.

Lysander shook his head. "I had a weird dream," he said, not moving from the threshold.

"You have nightmares?" Harper asked with a hint of judgment in her tone.

"It was mostly a memory."

"Doesn't make it any less of a nightmare."

Lysander took one step forward to change his posture in hopes that it would help him change the subject, asking with a hint of judgment, "You sing?"

"Oh, I'm a bloody rock god!" Harper said, watching Lysander take in the posters on her wall. "I also have a touch of wanderlust."

"I can see that," said Lysander, noticing as his eyes adjusted to the dim lighting that the world poster not only spun, but seemed to be magically highlighted in only a few countries. When he saw that England was one of them, he assumed that these were the ones Harper had been to. "How serious?"

"Stage four, I'm afraid. Nothing left to be done."

Lysander laughed. "I'm going for a walk, I think. You want to come?"

"Where are you headed?"

Truthfully, Lysander didn't know, but he usually had no destination and somehow still ended up in the same place. "The lighthouse, probably."

"You mean the Scurdie Ness?" It appeared Harper knew more about the place than Lysander did. "The one by the harbor?"

Lysander shrugged.

"Thanks, but I think I'll stay and sleep."

"You afraid of the dark?" asked Lysander, daring her a little.

"Afraid of the lighthouse," said Harper, getting up and walking toward him. She shimmied past him on her way to the loo and said, "That place is haunted."

Lysander wanted very much to argue with her, but something in him suspected she was right.

* * *

Hugo was scribbling notes on his parchment as fast as a Quick-Quotes Quill, and Lily's curious eyes couldn't keep up with his handwriting. She couldn't remember which section of his book he was working on now, but she was reading something about the beginning of magic and how its creation may connect to the way it is destroyed in witches and wizards who lose their magic. Hugo called them "Floes."

"Are there any other floes or is Scorpius the only one?" Lily whispered at Hugo from her seat beside him. Scorpius had lost his magic in exchange for his life during the Battle of the Blood.

"Oi, pay attention!" Hugo spat at her. "This guy has eyes in the back of his head."

They were in the middle of a two-hour Transfiguration class, but it was last period on Friday and Lily couldn't help but zone out. She thought they were sitting far enough back that their whispers wouldn't be heard, plus it wasn't as if Hugo was paying any more attention than he was, so she spat back, "Yeah, you're one to talk!"

Hugo looked Lily straight in the eyes and raised his hand to answer a question that the teacher hadn't even finished posing. Hugo had many expressions, but this was one Lily knew all too well: this was the face she had grown up loving, because this was pure confidence.

"So, knowing this, who can tell me the natural mutation exhibited in certain magical folk that is associated with human Transfiguration?" asked Professor Ito, who was new to Hogwarts this year upon replacing Minerva McGonagall.

Ito called on Hugo, and the Weasley said with his Granger voice, "The Metamorphmagus mutation, Sir, which allows the practitioner to take on an entirely different form or make various individual changes to their appearance, such as growing or changing the color of one's hair. Known Metamorphmagi include the late Nymphadora Tonks, her son Teddy Lupin, and his son Tony."

"Correct," said Professor Ito, the top half of his body leaning forward as if in a bow. Hugo winked to Lily. She crossed her arms and slouched back in her chair.

Professor Ito returned to the front of the classroom, tapping his hand on the shoulder of a new Slytherin girl on his way. She stood up and followed him to the front of the room, where they each faced the students. The girl looked just like the professor, and it was only upon seeing their similar dark hair, light skin, and slanted eyes with hazel hues that Lily realized the girl must be Ito's daughter.

"Human Transfiguration is a valuable tool for many reasons," Ito explained, "but where I come from, in Japan, its most valuable purpose is disguise. Allow Kazane here to demonstrate."

With his permission, the girl clutched her wand and closed her eyes, only her eyes weren't really closing. They rolled over and became different eyes, these ones fuller and brighter. And then her hair was shrinking while simultaneously lightning, until it was short and blond atop her head. Within minutes, she looked like a stereotypical Slytherin, a Malfoy or a Golding. And seconds after that, she was back to being herself.

"Thank you," said Professor Ito as some of the class began to clap, including a very reverential Hugo. Kazane sat down then, but Ito continued.

"Of course, human Transfigurations can only be held for so long, and it requires a great deal of focus, something which humans generally lack. Perhaps an even more powerful tool in the world of Transfiguration is the ability to transform wholly and completely into a different species. In other words, to become an Animagus."

The bell tolled right as Professor Ito's nose was turning into a snout, and as the students stood to leave they were all enraptured by the wolf that stood in their professor's place. He was larger than any wolf Lily had ever seen and his coat was the color of the moon. His eyes caught hers and in them she saw a part of herself.

Hugo had to pull her out of the classroom, but eventually Lily followed him until she ran straight into her father in the adjacent hallway. Hugo greeted his uncle and excused himself, and Lily was about to do the same before Harry said, "Wait. I came to talk to you."

Lily rolled her eyes and said, "Look, if this is about what you saw a few weeks ago, I really don't want to talk about it. And don't worry, I know what I'm doing. I'm keeping track of the moon cycle, I'm taking the wolfsbane Al gave me, and the Astronomy Tower was all in good fun-"

"Lily," Harry interrupted her. She finally let herself look up at his green eyes and she saw that they were not accusatory. They were open.

"That's not what I wanted to talk to you about," he said.

"It's not?" asked Lily. She'd been avoiding him the past fortnight, thinking he'd reprimand her for her escapades.

"No. I always had a knack for getting into trouble myself, especially when I was at Hogwarts. I think it'd be pretty hypocritical of me to not expect the same from you."

Lily smiled, and her cheeks felt like they hadn't been stretched that way in years. Maybe they really hadn't, or maybe it was just the scarring she'd accumulated from her werewolf nights that had made her skin more fragile.

"I wanted to show you something, actually," said Harry. "Do you have a minute?"

Nodding, Lily walked with her father up the moving staircases to the third floor, where they passed by the Armour Gallery and stopped in front of a door with a sign that read, _Trophy Room. No smudging._ Harry opened the door without having to unlock it and Lily gaped at the sight of hundreds upon thousands of trophies, cups, plates, shields, statues, and medals displayed among the marble columns of a room that was so endless Lily couldn't see a single wall.

Most of the trophies and cups sat on shelves behind glass cases, the plates and shields stuck to the walls, but some were floating, sending red sparks into the air or rusting momentarily as if calling for attention. The largest display was near the door, and though Harry passed right by, Lily paused to look at the large trophies for Services to the School presented to the likes of Tom Marvolo Riddle, Ron Weasley, Harry Potter. The legacy of her name never left Lily, but when she saw the name in print like this she felt like there was something rabid inside her, threatening to swallow her constricting heart.

Harry was leading her to the Quidditch section, where every silver Inter-House Cup trophy since Hogwarts' founding year was kept. There were more cups belonging to Slytherin than any other house, but Gryffindor had quite a few as well. Team-member names were engraved into each of the trophies, and it wasn't until they got up to 1950 or so that Lily started to recognize some of them.

"Look at the captains, not the houses," said Harry.

Lily did as she was told and read names like Minerva McGonagall, Steve Laughalot, James Potter, Regulus Black, Charlie Weasley, Oliver Wood, Harry Potter, Teddy Lupin, James Sirius Potter, Scorpius Malfoy, and Rose Weasley.

Rose's name was on the final cup even though that season had been cancelled due the battle. Gryffindor had been in the lead after the first two matches, which were the only ones that took place. Scorpius had captained one winning year, Teddy Lupin two, but James had captained five. The Potters were their own legacy, as were the Weasleys, but James was a legend.

Harry and Lily were both looking at his name when Harry said, "When you were little, I made sure to tell you every day that you were beautiful. But looking back, I'm not sure I told you enough how strong you were. These captains – my father, Teddy, James, Scorpius – they didn't lead teams to victory because they were pretty or because they were popular. It wasn't even because they were good at Quidditch. It was because they were respected, because they were strong. And so are you, Lily."

Lily brushed her hand along the scar on her cheek and said to her father, "It's nice that he'll always be in here."

"Yeah, though he probably would have been happier if Scorpius's trophy wasn't sitting in the middle of all of his," Harry laughed.

"No, he most definitely would not," said a different voice, causing Lily to look up and search for the source. A tall blond was walking toward them from the way they'd come, and for a moment, her heart skipped a beat. It settled when she saw that is Scorpius. Oddly, he hadn't been the person she'd been hoping to see.

"Scorpius," said Lily as he approached his own trophy. "What are you doing here? How was the honeymoon?"

Scorpius gave her a short hug and answered, "It was incredible. But then we got back and Rose rushed to the Auror office, so of course I was bored out of my mind within a week. Harry here said I could come visit for the match tomorrow, plus Hugo's been wanting to interview me again for his book."

Harry put a hand on Scorpius's shoulder and said, "_And_ you have an important announcement to make, which we've yet to chat about."

Scorpius blushed and Lily's eyes widened. "Wait, you aren't, Rose isn't-" she attempted to ask, grimacing at the thought of her cousins starting a family so quickly.

"No, no, nothing like that," said Scorpius. "You'll find out at the match tomorrow. Good luck, by the way."

"Thanks," said Lily, remaining glued to the floor as the chosen pair weaved their way out of the room. She looked at James's name once more and said, "I'll need it," before heading out herself.

Early the next morning, Lily stood at the back of a line of her teammates, clad in maroon red jerseys and capes with muddy brown pads and long, curving broomsticks. She adjusted her captain's band around her upper arm, gripped the Firebolt in her right hand, and walked onto the pitch behind Fred. Kenna was in the front and she must have been nearing the center of the field by now, because even from the locker room doors Lily could hear the cheering.

The sun blinded her as she stepped onto the grass in between the viewing stands that were full of Gryffindors on one side and Ravenclaws on the other. Both houses cheered for Lily's team, and she felt pride well up inside her like rain into a river. She looked behind her and into the stands so that she could spot Hugo amongst some of their fellow sixth years. He cupped his hands over his mouth when he saw her, and for a second she thought he was going to yell out her name or her number, but instead she heard his booming voice sound above the crowd, "REMEMBER JAMES."

Her eyes were still locked on Hugo's when he repeated the words, when Roxanne's voice sounded the words from a few meters in front of Lily, when two voices in the center pitch said them, when three said them from the stands, when the stands erupted in her brother's name.

Lily was shaking as she entered the circle her team and Slytherin's formed around James's grave. Harry stood inside the circle and beside the grave on Gryffindor's side, Scorpius on Slytherin's. Even the Slytherins – captain and Keeper Lindsay Doyle, newest Seeker Kazane Ito, and some players Lily didn't recognize – were chanting James's name, and when Harry lifted his hands to silence the crowd, Lily saw that he was crying.

"Thank you for that," Harry said when the voices settled, his holly wand pointed at his throat to amplify his voice. "Today marks the first Quidditch match of the season, a new beginning. It's been a hard year, but I think I can speak for everyone when I say that we're ready for a fresh start."

He looked at Lily and she winked. Sometimes she forgot that he'd lost a son because Harry had lost so many others in his life. He was good at grief, not like Lily, but that still didn't mean his grief was any easier to cope with than was her own.

Harry gestured for Scorpius to tag in, and Scorpius had to use a Muggle megaphone to amplify his own voice to say, "Hello everyone. My name is Scorpius Malfoy, and I captained the Slytherin Quidditch team for nearly three years. I wish I'd had the chance to lead it this year, but like many of my peers, I chose not to return to Hogwarts after the fighting in the battle that took place here. I was affected by that war in more ways than I can count, and it made me realize that I need to make a home for myself because Hogwarts wasn't built for just me. That's why I'll be opening a special school of my own starting this June, a summer school where you can live and learn how to become an Animagus. It is my pleasure to announce that that school will be named after a very important mentor in my life. It will be called the Minerva McGonagall School for Animagi."

The cheering began again, but Lily just looked down and smiled. Scorpius had come a long way from the abandoned boy she'd met at King's Cross Station. She still loved him, but it was different now. She finally understood that she had never been the one he needed, and for the first time in her life she knew that she didn't need him either.

Harry took over from there, the Quaffle in his hands, and though Lily and the other players were getting ready to mount their brooms, her father had more to say before letting the match begin. "Minerva has left me with some very large shoes to fill," he said, "and I think that she would agree that Hogwarts will never be the same as it was this time last year, and that's okay. We shan't fear the change, but rather _embrace _it. So, starting today I'd like to change the traditional start of Quidditch matches by adding a moment of silence for all those we've lost, Quidditch players and fans alike, and who unfortunately cannot be here with us today."

He was commanding the attention of hundreds of people, and he was doing well. Every pair of eyes, without any exception, was on Harry as he said, "In a moment, I'm going to name some roles of people we all have or have had at some point in our lives. If you lost that person to the recent war, please lift your wand to the sky and send one red spark into the air."

Harry had been pacing in circles so that he could face everyone as he spoke, but now he stopped, faced the tallest stand where the professors and commentator Lila Jordan were seated, and said, "Friend."

Every professor sent a spark into the air, along with at least ten students from each house. On the pitch, the entire Slytherin team and Scorpius did the same, honoring their late Beater, Arnia Samuels. The Gryffindor team followed, and as Fred's hand lowered once more, it wrapped around Lily's still one and squeezed.

"Grandparent," said Harry, and Lily let her tears fall. Their hands still clasped, she and Fred pointed their wands into the air, waited for their cousins to do the same, and then sent a spark up for Arthur Weasley. Scorpius repeated the action for his own grandmother, Narcissa.

"Parent." Lily watched Kenna send up her spark, and then Scorpius again for his father, Draco. In the stands, Hugo made sparks in place of Nigel, whose parents Dennis and Natalie had both been killed on the shores of the Black Lake.

"Sibling." This role exhibited the fewest sparks thus far, with just a couple from students in the stands. It took all of Lily's strength to lift her own hand, but Scorpius helped her by lifting his too. He had been with James when James had died, and so Scorpius had lost a brother too.

"Child." For this one, Harry and Professor Longbottom were the only ones who raised their hands, but they were not the only ones who felt the sting.

Everyone was quiet for a long while, waiting for Harry to stir. He was reading James's gravestone, and then he walked over to Lily and hugged her before facing the crowd again. Sniffling slightly, he said, "The point of that was not to feel sad or uncomfortable. The point was to remind us that we are _not_ alone."

Scorpius shuffled beside him, pulling a small case out of his pant pocket and opening it to release the Golden Snitch. Harry grinned, threw the Quaffle into the air, and said, "Let the game begin."

Lily mounted her broom quickly, set her eyes on the Quaffle, grabbed it with her whole body, and held on tight.

* * *

"And we're all tied up again folks, Harper – Harper, that's her name right? – Harper Frye scoring for the Magpies and bringing them up sixty to sixty against the Famous Falcons," announced professional English league commentator, Bill Loudspeak, who must have been pushing on 107 years old.

"FLY, FRYE, FLY!" chanted the fans as Harper whipped back around the Falcon hoops to catch the Quaffle and threw it ahead to Grady. He was even more popular with the audience, mainly because he liked to pump them up, lifting his free hand in the air to signal their chants. It was a win-win, because it also distracted the Falcons long enough for Grady to perform a Reverse Pass and throw the Quaffle behind him, back to Harper.

Lysander was defending Harper at the moment, and sped in front of her to hit an incoming Bludger back across the pitch to Liam, flying simultaneously with the Quaffle Harper had just hit toward Henry. The Bludger, being both smaller and heavier than the Quaffle, arrived first and was hit hard by Liam toward one of the two remaining Chasers on the Falcons. It met with the Chaser's stomach and knocked him off his broom. Half the audience cheered, "Hit him!" and the other half cheered, "HARD!" It helped to play a home game.

Things turned sour, though, when Henry lost control of the Quaffle in the chaos and let it go to the Falcons, their only Chaser left scoring before Magpies Keeper Pierre could stop it.

"That puts the Falmouth Falcons ahead again with sixty plus ten – seventy! – points as Harry Cavendish lets go of the Quaffle and Aaron Goodall SCORES! Honestly, folks, haven't we had it with Cavendish?" said Loudspeak.

His words kick-started an ugly booing chant of the repeated mantra, "Had it with Cavendish! Time to ditch Cavendish!"

Lysander rolled his eyes and bounced the Beater bat between his hands. Leaving Liam to fend against the Falcons Beaters himself, Lysander followed Grady down the center of the pitch as the Chaser retrieved the Quaffle. Goodall was right on Grady's tail, ready to intercept if Grady attempted to pass the ball to either Harper or Henry.

In the background, the audience was still booing Henry, and it seemed to be rubbing off on the Magpies elder, because soon Henry was speeding toward a rogue Bludger, which he hit at the stands with the back of his broom. A flying referee intercepted and hit the Bludger away from the fans, then gave Henry a foul for Bumphing, benching him for the rest of the match.

Lysander didn't have time to be too disappointed about this, since the Bludger was headed back in his direction. Just as Goodall started messing with Grady's broom and caused Grady to drop the Quaffle, Lysander swooped in and hit the Bludger in the direction of the larger, red ball. The two connected and the force sent the Quaffle flying for the Falcons hoops.

"Will you look at that! Magpies Chaser – wait, no, Beater, _Beater – _Lysander Scamander scores! We're tied up at seventy now, folks."

"Wooo, go Lysander!" a voice cried from the stands, just behind the Falcons goal posts. Lysander spun his head around to see his mother, Luna, jumping up and down and flapping the wings of the magpie costume she'd made herself for the occasion. Lysander hadn't asked her to come, but Luna had insisted.

Grady readjusted in time to catch the Quaffle on the backside of the goalposts, looping back around and attempting to score himself, but the Falcons Keeper caught the Quaffle and hit it to Goodall. Lysander steered his broom back toward the Magpies hoops and flew centimeters away from a pretty blonde Beater to await the next Bludger.

Below him, Erick and the Falcons Seeker had just spotted the Snitch and had taken off after it. "Is something happening down there?" asked Loudspeak. "I-I can't see that far! Somebody get me my glasses! Ah, yes, there they are – the Seekers are following the Snitch now, and the new German recruit is in the lead. They look awfully close to the pitch…"

Lysander had just tossed a Bludger toward Aaron as the Chasers took turns with the Quaffle and he had the chance to look down, where Erick was leading the other Seeker closer and closer to the grass. This was a tactic known as the Wronski Feint, made famous by retired Bulgarian Seeker, Viktor Krum. Erik was following the Snitch while also trying to get the other Seeker to stumble onto the ground and be disqualified. It was impossible to tell from this angle if the play was working, but Lysander suspected Erick knew what he was doing.

That was until the referee's whistle blew and Lysander was watching both Seekers be escorted off their brooms. Erick was yelling and fighting with the ref, and Lysander even thought he saw Erick spit in the referee's face, but it didn't matter. No one could object the decision, and soon Loudspeak was announcing, "I've been informed that both Seekers have been disqualified for flying out of bounds. This means that, since the Snitch cannot be caught and we are currently at a tie, the next goal made will decide the winner!"

Lysander sighed and made eye contact with Liam from the other side of the pitch. The three Chasers were in between them, the Falcons Beaters making their own plan, but it was only Goodall Liam and Lysander were after. With Liam's nod and the sight of a Bludger headed in his direction, Lysander accelerated, swerving through the Chasers and making it to Liam just in time to whack the Bludger with his bat at the exact moment Liam did. The extra force sent the Bludger flying for Goodall, but it only made contact with the tip of his broom. He lost all control and spun in circles toward the Magpies goal posts, and somehow he banged into Harper and managed to snatch the Quaffle from her. With one throw, he ended the match and won for the Falmouth Falcons.

The dismount was slow and frustrating, because none of the Magpies wanted to accept defeat after all they'd been through, and none of them wanted to take the blame. It was only the fans, somehow managing to cheer for their team even with the loss, who willed Lysander off his broom. His legs felt liquefied as he stepped onto the pitch, as if they weren't meant for dry land, and he had to think about every step he took as he slowly made his way to the locker room.

"The ref was _seriously_ out of line!" Grady's yell blasted through the cramped room, where the rest of the team was waiting and arguing. "There's no way Lazer touched the ground!"

Grady was stomping his feet and hitting lockers. A meter away from him, Erick sat on a bench with his eyes burning holes in the floor. "_Lazer,"_ he growled, "is like a stage name. You might as well call me ze German, or Germ, for zat matter."

"Germ," said Grady, hands on his hips, "I like that!"

"It wasn't just that," said Henry, who was leaning on a locker next to a banged up Liam. "He disqualified me for defending myself!"

"Against the audience," said Pierre from the same bench as Erick. His stance was calm, but his voice was thick, weighty, heated. "What were you thinking? You don't hit at the _fans!"_

"Well, clearly they're not _my _fans, are they?!" Henry retorted.

"My _mother_ was in those stands!" yelled Pierre. "You could have hit her. You could have hit anyone!"

"Yeah, man, what about your wife?" Grady asked Henry.

Henry laughed. "Hattie wasn't here," he said, but the statement didn't gain him any pity.

Grady asked if that meant Henry was having marital issues, causing Henry to leap at him and be held back by Liam. As Liam lunged, the collar of his jersey scrunched up and Harper whispered in Lysander's ear, "Is that blood on Liam's number?"

Their jerseys were jet black except for the numbers, which were meant to be white, but Liam's number one was splattered with red. "Hey, hey!" Lysander butt in, pulling Liam off Henry and letting Grady fend for himself. "Are you injured?" he asked Liam.

Liam looked at Lysander like he was mental. "What?" he asked.

Lysander gestured to the jersey, but Liam rolled his eyes and said, "I'm a messy eater, Twenty-one. Calm down." Then he scanned the rest of the team and said more loudly, "Actually, let's _all _calm down! The fact is we played terribly out there, and it doesn't matter how harsh the referee was. We should be prepared for that. And more importantly, we should be able to communicate with each other at any moment in the game. We need to develop a-"

"Sixth sense," Lysander finished for him. Liam nodded. Out there on that pitch, they had been the only ones in sync with each other.

"Agreed?" asked Liam.

"Agreed," said the other six in unison.

"All right, then. Take the day off tomorrow. We meet here at six AM on Monday."

Lysander was quick to get changed and skipped his shower so that he could get away from the depressing air. He also had someone to see. Luna was waiting for him outside the stadium, though he barely recognized her without the bird costume; she must have taken it off after the game ended.

"Hey, Mum," he said, approaching her from behind. It wasn't very sunny, but her long, ratty hair was as bright as it had always been.

"My boy," she said, opening her arms. He walked into them and pulled her close, breathing in the scent of radishes that lived in her skin. He wanted to break down in these arms, close his eyes and cry like any little boy might, but ever since his father had gone to Azkaban, Lysander and Luna had been separated by some metaphysical wall. He couldn't cry in front of anyone, but he especially couldn't in front of Luna.

"You played brilliantly," she said as their embrace broke. She started walking before he could suggest it, headed for the water.

Luna always walked gracefully, even if it was a different kind of grace than most people expected. She walked like waves, her feet rolling on and off the ground so that every toe became one with the dirt.

Catching up to her, Lysander watched her as she stared at the sand and drew circles around the sea glass. "How have you been, Mum? How's Neville? And Holly?" He had grown up being concerned for his mother, had trained himself to be more of a parent than she'd been when Rolf had lost his mind and she had followed. Lysander knew that Neville, whom Luna had married last Christmas, would take better care of her than Lysander ever could, but sometimes he still worried.

"Oh, they're all right," she said in her usual airy tone. "They're at Hogwarts, though, so I don't see them much these days." Neville taught Herbology and his daughter, Holly, had just started her sixth year.

"Do you miss them?" asked Lysander, thinking for some off reason that he'd get a real answer.

"That would be foolish of me. They'll be back soon," said Luna, now approaching the Scurdie Ness. Lysander's curiosity was one of the few traits he'd received from his mother, so he wasn't surprised when she opened the door to the lighthouse and started climbing the spiral staircase.

They were halfway up when Lysander asked, "Do you miss Lorcan?"

Like much of Luna's personality, she didn't grieve the way most people did. She had never seemed sad about her mother's death, which she had witnessed at a young age. Even when her father Xenophilius had passed, Luna had accepted it quickly. She was never able to accept Rolf's arrest, but maybe that was because it lacked permanence. Maybe the permanent things were somehow easier for her to deal with. Maybe it was transiency she struggled with… things like loneliness, popularity, and friendship.

"I try not to," she said when they reached the top. The sun was starting to set, the stars beginning to shine their way through the clouds. "It's easier when I talk to him. Plus, it's not as if I'll never see him again, right?"

"So, you really believe in Heaven?" Lysander asked. "You really believe he's somewhere up in the clouds?"

"No, I think he's higher than that," said Luna, turning to her son, her lone twin. "I think he's up in the stars."

"Yeah," said Lysander, turning away from Luna's silvery grey eyes. "Me too."

* * *

Everything was red. The entire common room was decorated in Gryffindor colors, and roaring lions swayed from banners floating below the ceiling. The house had been celebrating their victory for hours now, recounting the best moments of the match and begging players to go so far as re-enact them. Youngest team member, second-year Olivia Wood, had defended ten attempted goals from Slytherin Chasers, and the Gryffindor Chasers had leaped from broom to broom to confuse Lindsay Doyle before they scored. And then there was Kenna, who had caught the Snitch in her mane of hair.

Now, Lily was sitting exhausted on the couch by the fireplace, Hugo and Roxanne on either side of her, but Kenna was still a ball of energy. Dancing her way through some boys in her year, she approached the couch and asked, "Who wants to play Kings?"

Lily raised her eyebrows and was about to say no, but then she saw the booze Kenna motioned toward on the table by the window. There were quarts of butterbeer left, along with firewhiskey, multiple bottles of vodka, and a few fine whines. Suddenly bursting with energy herself, Lily grinned and said, "I do."

Hugo and Roxy shook their heads, but Lily pleaded with them and pulled them from the couch until they followed, picking up Fred and Lila, who were in the middle of a snog session, on the way. They took their seats – Roxy in the corner next to Hugo, who was beside Lily and then Kenna, Lila, and Fred – around a large table and started reaching for their preferred drinks and a deck of wizards' cards when Roxanne asked quietly, "Er, what are the rules exactly? I've never played."

Kenna seemed surprised, but explained nonetheless. "It's a simple drawing game, where we go around in a circle and take turns drawing cards. Each card has a different task associated with it that will designate who has to drink and how much. The kings are the most important – each time one is drawn, everyone has to pour a bit of their drink into the center cup. Then, whoever draws the fourth and final king has to drink the entirety of that cup."

Roxanne gulped, her eyes wide, but Hugo nudged her with his shoulder and said, "It's fun once you get started." Fred added in, "And you don't have to do anything you don't want to do."

Once the cards were magically shuffled, Kenna asked Lily, "You want to do the honors?"

"Sure," Lily said, flicking her wand at the cards and silently enchanting them for the game. This way, each card would enforce its designated task on the player who drew it, and would keep anyone from cheating. Only the end of the game or Lily could stop the spell.

The first card revealed itself to Kenna. It was a seven, and as the card floated in front of Kenna the seven diamonds lifted off the card and formed a red mouth attached to nothing, much like a Howler. Then that mouth said, "I require seven spells in seven seconds to be produced by one Kenna Meyer."

Everyone grimaced at that, most of them wondering if such a task could be done. Roxanne looked at Lily nervously and Fred pressed his palms together, biting his lip. Kenna was confident as she stretched her neck left and right while awaiting the countdown. On three, she gripped her wand and started naming spells.

"_Aguamenti!" _she said, and water spewed from her wand and into the central cup.

"_Accio," _and the glass flew to her hands.

"_Incendio," _and the water caught on fire within the glass.

"_Engorgio," _and the fire swelled, its flames shooting out the brim.

"_Reducio," _and the fire returned to its original state.

She was about to put the fire out when the playing card's mouth fell into pieces on the table and then turned into a hand, grabbing Kenna's lemon drop and pouring it down her throat for a full seven seconds. When it was over, she wasn't the only one who had to catch her breath, since everyone else had been holding theirs in as well.

Lila was up next, and she and Fred were the only ones spared from a drink when she drew an Ace and the card instructed all those under the Trace, or younger than seventeen, to take a shot. Lily's firewhiskey burned in the best way at it slid down her throat, and for some reason she was trying to remember what her Sorting Ceremony had been like. Had the Hat considered any house other than Gryffindor? Because this pain Lily felt, this pain she enjoyed, reminded her of gluttony and greed, two traits typically associated with the Slytherin serpent.

Her focus returned to the game when a floating, hooded queen pointed her staff at Fred and ordered him to name a famous Quidditch player. Freaked by the queen, he reclined in his seat and said, "Brutus Scrimgeour!" Scrimgeour's book _The Beater's Bible_ had been a bestseller for ten consecutive months.

The queen moved on and pointed at Roxanne next, who must have had someone in mind because she practically screamed at the queen, "Hamish MacFarlan!" who had captained the Montrose Magpies before retiring to the Ministry as Head of the Department of Magical Games and Sports. He had died a few years back.

"Joey Jenkins!" said Hugo before the queen even pointed at him. When she didn't move on right away, Hugo argued, "Oh, come off it! Just because he was on the Chudley Cannons doesn't mean he's not famous." The queen stood her ground and even swung her staff near Hugo's face, causing Hugo to surrender and say, "Fine, Vik-Viktor Krum!"

"Ginevra Weasley," said Lily proudly, and some of her friends smiled and clapped.

Kenna was stumped for moment, but managed to say just in time, "Oh, the Lazer… er, Erick Ludwig!"

"Bullocks, that was mine!" Lila said to Kenna as the queen moved on to her, beginning to panic. "Oh no, um, who captained the French National team last year?" She snapped her fingers and said, "Gabrielle Delacour!"

The queen had moved all the way around the table and was back at Fred, who stuck out his tongue at the magical card and said, "Ludo Bagman! _HA!"_

Roxy still had her eyes shut, but Fred was drumming on her shoulders and Hugo's fists were banging at the table waiting for her to take her turn. The queen's staff had Roxy's butterbeer floating mid-air and it was about to puncture a hole in the glass that would pour the drink straight up Roxanne's nostrils when Roxy said, "Gwenog… Bugger! What's her last name?"

She was coughing beer out of her nose when the rest of the table sighed and yelled, "Gwenog _Jones!"_

Roxanne covered her eyes out of shame and looked fearful for her turn, but it was an easy one. The card was a three and told a summarized version of the Tale of the Three Brothers before ordering all the males at the table, in this case only Fred and Hugo, to drink.

Hugo drew the jack and was ordered to drink every time any other player did for the remainder of the game, or until another jack was drawn. Luckily, Hugo had inherited his high tolerance for alcohol from his father.

Lily drew a ten: categories. Everyone liked this round, especially when the category Lily chose was dragons. Kenna went first and named the Swedish Shortsnout, Lila the Hungarian Horntail, Fred the Chinese Fireball, Roxanne the Welsh Green, Hugo the Ukrainian Ironbelly, Lily the Hebridean Black, and Kenna lost when she couldn't think of her second species.

The second round was even more fun, and while they repeated some cards (naming Quidditch players again proved to be massively difficult) they also drew new ones that required them to pick mates or rhyme or name wand cores. Hugo was more than tipsy when the second jack was finally drawn by Fred, and then when Fred chose Lila as his drinking mate, the two of them had to drink on every card. The central cup was half-full and nobody was anywhere near sober when Lily drew her fourth card.

It was a six, and when Lily saw it she turned to Kenna and the two of them clanked their glasses together while yelling, "WITCHES!" Across the table, Roxanne, Lila, and Fred,= all joined them.

Kenna was laughing manically during her turn, so it was a good thing she didn't have to draw the card herself. She squinted her eyes at the one presented to her and smiled at the two of hearts. "Hmm," she murmured, "Most likely to believe in the Crumple-Horned Snorkack!"

Everyone except Roxanne pointed at Roxanne, and Lila seemed offended when Roxy pointed to her. Disgruntled, Roxy asked the group but directed her question at Lily, "Do I have to? I think I'm about to explode."

"Sorry," said Kenna. "Game's a game, and the card's pointing at you."

Roxy gave in and took a small sip of her beer, looking displeased when she gulped it down.

Lila drew the first five of the game, and nobody was prepared when they were told to produce a Patronus Charm. The buzz was unexpectedly helpful for Lila, it seemed, who thought quickly of happy memories and produced a full-formed lioness that roared beside Fred's lion. Roxanne had trouble focusing, but eventually a miniature mermaid flopped atop her head. Even Hugo, who was known to be unskilled with applied magic, managed to produce a jumpy kangaroo. It was Lily who ended the round, not able to think of something strong enough to conjure her zebra.

"That's so weird," she said after finishing her third glass of whiskey. "I got it on my second try last year."

Roxy smiled at her and said, "Don't worry, Lil. You're just out of it, that's all."

"I am _not!"_ Lily teased, but as she leaned forward in her chair she nearly slipped off of it.

It was Fred's turn next, and he drew the third king. Everyone who still had anything in their glasses poured a bit of it in the central cup, which was now filled to the brim with some fizzing mixture of unknown origins, its bottom a thick brown color with sections of red and a white foam at the top. "Yummy," said Hugo.

Roxy laughed at him and awaited her card, shocked when it was another king. She was reaching for her glass to pour it into the center when the king stopped her and ordered her to drink the entirety of the central glass. "What?" she asked, more than panicked now. Her eyes weren't so much wide as they were wet, and Lily knew even through her drunkenness that Roxanne was petrified. "I-I can't drink all that! It'll kill me!"

"It's okay-" Lila was about to say, but Kenna cut her off.

"Stop chickening out, Roxy Ffffoxy!" said Kenna, slurring her words. "It's good for you."

The glass was now floating slowly toward Roxanne and Fred was glaring at Kenna. "With all due respect, Meyer, please _sod off_ my sister." Then to Lily, he said, "You're the one who started the game, Lil. Just end it. Nobody needs to drink that."

Kenna was furious and Lily kept looking between her and Fred, not knowing what to do. "I can't just break the rules, Freddie," said Lily, Fred grimacing at the unusual nickname.

"Lily, come on, call it off," said Hugo, who had his wand pointed at her.

Roxanne was crying now and the glass was touching her lips and tilting forward so that the foam stuck to her skin. Lily just sat there, silent, Kenna's hand on her knee.

"_Reducto!" _Fred yelled and pointed his wand at the glass to try to make it break, but the spell rebounded and blasted against his chest. Lila whimpered momentarily, but Fred came to quickly and sat back up.

Realizing there was nothing any of them could do about it, Fred, Hugo, and Lila all stroked Roxanne's arms and tried to encourage her gently as the alcohol poured faster and faster down her throat. When it was all gone, Fred and Lila carried a sickly Roxanne to the washroom and Hugo gave Lily an expression she'd never seen on him before.

Unlike his confident face, Lily wasn't sure what this one was meant to say. His eyes were half closed and angry, his brows an overturned frown, and his jaw was clenched so hard that his freckles looked like embers burning through his cheeks. He stood up and towered above her, because he'd also inherited his father's height, and asked her, "Are you a mean drunk, Lil, or just a mean person?" He walked away before she could answer.

Lily wasn't sure how much time went by before she spoke again, but when she did no one was left in the whole common room aside from her and Kenna. The place was trashed, banners wilting, crisp crumbs littering the floor, and beer staining every surface. Still, it wasn't the room Lily felt guilty for when she asked, "What have I done?"

"You've done nothing!" said Kenna, pulling Lily up off her chair. She was rubbing her back as she led a numb Lily toward the staircase and said, "Everything will be fine, trust me."

"How do you know?" Lily asked hopelessly.

"I'm your sister," said Kenna. "I have a sixth sense about you."

* * *

_**Note: **Thanks for reading! I hope you liked it, and please leave a review! I'd especially love to know what you're thinking of the original characters, Harper or Kenna for example. All of them will become more fleshed out and integral as the story progresses. I also just wanted to say that **alcohol WILL play an important role in this story, and it will not be a particularly good one. I am choosing to write about this serious issue for personal reasons and because I think it's relevant to Lily's character. Please do not continue reading this story if you think in any way that this will be a trigger for you. I don't mean to make any readers feel pressured, attacked, or hurt.**_

_From now on, I'll be posting a spoiler for every chapter on my profile (and yes, Lysander and Lily will actually interact with each other in Chapter 3), so be sure to check that out if you're curious, and remember to also ask me if you'd like more spoilers or any sort of clarifications._

_-Hailey_


	3. Corvus

_**Note:** Hi everyone! Thanks for your kind reviews on Chapter 2. For those of you 'Blood of the Birds' readers, this chapter will have many familiar faces. I tried to explain who everyone was in case you haven't read 'BotB,' but I'm sorry if this is slightly overwhelming. This chapter's set of characters is an exception to the norm, for sure. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy Christmas in July!_

_-Hailey_

* * *

**3 – Corvus**

Lily's stomach howled, and she had to cop hold of the sliding door handle to steady herself. Last night had been a full moon, and she'd tied her ankle to a tree in the Forbidden Forest to ensure that she wouldn't miss the train the next morning. Unfortunately, she almost had, having woken up sweating in the frost with scratches in the shape of claws lining her own body. She could really go for a drink now, though.

Once stable, Lily opened the door and stepped into the next train car while openly examining her flask. There wasn't a drop of alcohol left; she and Kenna had drained the latter's supply while studying for their mid-terms. "Bullocks," Lily muttered, regretting the decision.

Kenna was probably already home by now. Most of the Scottish students opted out of taking the Hogwarts Express to get home and back, as it made no sense to head the exact wrong direction. Lily imagined Kenna already raiding her sister's bar and a jealous fire spread through Lily's center. Maybe she should have stayed at Hogwarts over the holidays.

"Excuse me," said someone as she tried to push past. Lily clung to the moving walls of the narrow hallway and then turned back to see the girl. It was Kazane Ito, the transfer from the Mahoutokoro School of Magic in Japan, and Lily smiled at the way Kazane walked: chest out, bum out, like her feet themselves were heels.

As Lily faced forward once more, her eyes caught on those of the Gryff Group, sitting in the closest compartment and separated from Lily by a single glass door. Fred was facing that door, his back leaning against the opposite window with his legs on the seat, half propped up over Lila's lap. His glare was harsh and unwavering, but Hugo's was worse. Hugo was across from Fred, and he just looked disappointed. Roxanne was the only one looking away, and Roxy's refusal to face Lily hurt far more than either look the boys had given her.

Lily moved on and ended up in a compartment with Holly Longbottom, fellow sixth year from Hufflepuff. Lily didn't know Holly all that well, since Holly and Hugo had always loathed each other, but it was the least crowded compartment available.

"Hi," said Lily as she sat down, though Holly didn't respond. She was busy reading the latest issue of the _Quibbler_, the very unique magazine Holly's step-mother Luna was the editor of.

Lily could just make out a moving image on the front page of the _Quibbler_. There was a man riding a broomstick in a black jersey, a Beater's bat in his hand and a styled mop of gorgeously blonde hair on his head. It was Lysander.

"You look happy," said Holly suddenly, making Lily instinctively thrust a hand to her blushing cheek to hide her scars there. "Oh no, don't do that!" Holly raised her voice. "You'll cover your dimples!"

"I have dimples?" asked Lily. She'd never heard this before.

Holly laughed, revealing her own dimples that cut her puffy cheeks in half. Lily had never thought much of Holly's appearance – plain brown hair parted on the left side, heart-shaped face with a pointed chin, blue eyes that could have belonged to any one of Lily's cousins – but now she realized that she liked the way Holly's whole face stretched when she smiled.

In a nicer tone than usual, Lily said, "I was just looking at the cover of your magazine. I didn't know the Magpies had won their first match."

"They didn't," said Holly as if Lily should have known. "But the _Quibbler _often highlights the underdog.

Lily nodded, wondering how James's absence had been affecting the team. She was sure it was somehow, as it was most definitely affecting hers.

"Would you like to have it?" Holly asked, holding the _Quibbler_ out to Lily. "I've finished reading anyway."

"Thanks," Lily took the issue and spent most of the train ride watching Lysander fly off the page.

She was asleep when the train slowed to a halt at Platform 9¾. Holly shook Lily's shoulder to wake her before walking out, her lion-like cat trailing behind on a leash. Lily waited a while for the platform crowd to dissipate before she jumped off and searched for her own family, looking for red hair and eventually spotting her mother and uncle's ginger heads near the back wall.

Lily felt like she floated into Ginny's arms, and for a moment nothing existed but her mother, not the people or their screeching owls or the smoking train, just her. She breathed in the scent of something flowery and buried her face in Ginny's hair so that no one could tell where Ginny ended and Lily began. But something was off.

Ginny was known for her hugs; she'd had them perfected since childhood and they were snug and sincere, but this one felt weak. This one felt like Ginny was barely holding on, her arms simply touching Lily's back but not really _clutching_ it. As the two broke apart, Lily understood that the weakness had nothing to do with Lily's own fragility as a werewolf. Losing James had left a hole in her mother, and Ginny no longer had enough to hold on to.

"Welcome home," said Ginny nonetheless, trying.

Lily looked away and saw her brother. Albus was standing in between Ginny and Ron, two people he would have been very uncomfortable to stand beside a year ago. Lily hadn't seen him since Rose and Scorpius's wedding, but he looked good: cleanly shaven, black hair as messy as ever but at least not too long, green eyes shining, though still sad, still guilty.

Al's hug was better, and Lily held it for a few moments longer than usual. She tousled Al's hair playfully afterward, and he cringed just like she knew he would. Lily then gave a short hug to her uncle Ron before seeing Nigel Creevey on Ron's other side. He hugged Lily before she could stop him, but then Ron spotted Hugo and Nigel let her go to greet his boyfriend.

Hugo gave Nigel a huge, sloppy kiss in front of everyone, and as Lily watched the reunion of her two friends, who had come so far to finally be together, her stomach started howling again.

Nigel was the first to break away since he could only stand on his tiptoes for so long, and Hugo said nothing to Lily as Ron patted Ginny on the shoulder and said, "See you at Christmas, yeah?"

Ginny nodded. It was tradition for the Potters and Weasleys to spend Christmas morning together at the Bird's Nest, Ron and Hermione's house, but Ron had still posed the invitation as a question just in case the Potters wanted to put the celebration on hold in place of their grief.

The three were walking toward the brick wall, Hugo asking his father if they could Apparate back since he'd been practicing at Hogwarts, and as Lily looked on at them she began to think that the pain in her stomach wasn't physical at all. Like Ginny, she didn't feel injured so much as wounded. Like Al, she didn't feel bruised so much as unhealed. She didn't feel pain so much as loneliness.

* * *

It hadn't snowed yet. Lysander supposed that was a good thing, considering it made his multi-stop Apparition easier when he didn't drag snowflakes along with his luggage. For some reason, though, he missed the nuisance that was this magical white substance. He wanted a white Christmas because he didn't want it to feel any different than the ones he remembered from childhood. Of course, this wish was childish in of itself, because this Christmas _would_ be different. It had to be.

Lysander tried not to think about that as he turned on the spot and opened his eyes to Glasgow, then again to Carlisle, then to Blackpool and Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, and finally Devon. He ran from there to Ottery St. Catchpole, breathing in the warm air of the southern isle and dragging his rucksack up and down the hills until he passed the Burrow, then the Bird's Nest, walking through the village and along the stream that led to what Lysander had always called the Rook.

The Lovegood house, which had become the Scamander house when Luna had married Rolf and Xenophilius had died, and which Lysander realized was technically now the Longbottom house, was not shaped so much like the bird as like the chess piece. It was crookedly cylindrical, but it was black like a crow, and rooks often nested atop its flat roof. Lysander took a deep breath; he hadn't been here since Lorcan's funeral and it had never felt much like home to him as a kid. He'd preferred the outdoors, the night sky, to the house itself, and by the time he turned eleven he was spending most of his time at Hogwarts or with James in Godric's Hollow. With another breath, he opened the recently refurbished gate, passing the painted signs that read "Editor of the _Quibbler_" and "Pick Your own Mistletoe" and walking along the zig-zagged pathway to the front door. He pinched a Dirigible plum to watch the juice splatter out and picked a crab apple off the tree by the door, then turned the handle and stepped inside.

"Mum?" he called out from the circular kitchen, sorting through a pile of old letters on the counter. Most were addressed to Lorcan, but Lysander didn't have the heart to throw them out.

He heard footsteps booming down the spiral staircase from the center of the room, but when he turned around Lysander was surprised to see a dark-haired girl in a thick blue coat… clearly not his mother. The girl glanced at Lysander for less than a second on her way out, but he knew those eyes; he knew those tears. It was Lucy Weasley.

Tentatively, Lysander dropped his bag and walked upstairs, where he found Luna sipping Gurdyroot tea on the right side of their cluttered sofa. "What was Lucy doing here?" he asked, used to the lack of greeting from his mother.

"She comes by sometimes to talk," said Luna, smiling at him. She cleared a spot on the sofa beside her and he took a seat, sighing when she wrapped her arm around his shoulders. He didn't usually sit in the middle.

"What did you talk about?" he asked.

Luna looked him in the eyes and he knew immediately that what she said next would be important. "She wants to change her name. She wants to be a Scamander."

Lysander moved out of Lorcan's seat and onto the left side that had always been his. He pulled on his necklace until his neck stung and he said, "And I don't get to have a say in this?" It wasn't even Luna's name anymore, and Rolf was in Azkaban, and Rolf's sister had married, and Lorcan was gone. It was just him. Lysander was the last Scamander left. He should be in control of who the next one was.

"She wants to be a part of this family," said Luna, not moving even with the large distance placed between them.

Lysander looked out the window and saw Neville and Holly walking through the yard below. He remembered how happy he'd been at the wedding, before the battle had started, to know that his mom would still have a family after he and Lorcan moved out of the house. Now, though, he missed her even as he sat beside her. He missed her even as he said, "I'm a part of this family too."

* * *

There were four stuffed animals on the floor. One was a stag, one a scruffy black dog, one an enlarged rat, and the last a werewolf. All were magically enchanted in some way, so it was hard for Lily to get her niece to listen as Remy watched the werewolf howl and practiced her own howl back. Remy had been born a werewolf, and it had been her bite that had changed Lily's life.

"That's Loony," said Lily, "that's your grandpa."

"Grandpa?" asked Remy, confused. She was almost two and a half years old now.

Lily nodded. "And this one," she pointed to the stag, "This one's _my_ grandfather. Prongs."

"Pwongs," Remy repeated, though she was still holding the werewolf. "Ow-owuuuuu!" she howled, her mouth stretched into a long 'O.' She had scratches around her lips, and Lily knew all too well the amount of times her snout must have banged into things as she'd tried to sniff things the other night. Teddy and Victoire kept their daughter under tight surveillance on every full moon, but now that she could walk her puppy werewolf form had surely torn apart most of their house.

"No signs in Tony yet, right?" Lily heard Al asking Teddy inside Al's bedroom. Their rooms were adjacent to each other, separated only by an open bathroom.

"No, thank goodness," said Teddy. Tony, his son, had been born this past April, and though his parents had been thrilled to see that he was a Metamorphmagus like his father, they still worried about his own werewolf genes.

They were silent for a while as Remy grinded her tiny teeth at the stuffed animal and Wormtail looked on in jealousy. Then Al asked concernedly, "How's Dom? Is she still looking for him?" Dominique had been living with her sister and Teddy for the past few years after suffering from chronic depression. She'd be joining the Potters and Lupins for Christmas Eve dinner tomorrow night.

"More than ever," said Teddy. "Every crow she sees makes her eyes light up. I just wish Knox had said where he was going. You know, I could have tracked him down, dragged him back here. I still have a lot to thank him for myself."

Remy was making crow noises to regain Lily's attention, but Lily was distracted, her mind caught on the image of Ryder Rookwood, the woman she'd fought and killed in battle. Knox was her twin brother, and he too had been a member of the Forbidden Flock, but he'd been different. He'd been like Al, playing the wrong side but always truly belonging to the right one. Knox must have done something for Teddy in the battle before fighting Astoria all the way from the top floor of the Hogwarts castle to the Quidditch pitch. Once the battle was over, he'd disappeared, much like he had soon after he and Dominique had moved in together about five years ago. Lily was hoping he would never return.

When Al said to Teddy, "Yeah, me too, but he'll come around; he always does," Lily scooped up Remy and the wolf she wouldn't let go of, walked through the loo and into Al's bedroom, and said, "Hey, you guys ready to go?"

"Yeah," said Al, walking over and taking Remy from Lily's arms. "What do you have here, huh? You got a little puppy?" He cooed at her. Al had always been brilliant with kids.

The boys were walking out, but Lily was behind them, scouring Al's bookshelf for alcohol. He had all sorts of potions ingredients stored in no particular order on splintered black wood, but eventually Lily spotted a small bottle of firewhiskey behind some crushed horn. She snatched the bottle and ran to catch up while yelling, "Should I grab a broom or are Remy and I using Flu Powder?"

"Neither!" yelled Al from the first floor. "Today, we'll be traveling to London in style."

Lily grinned knowingly and sprinted past him. Al's pet dragon and best friend, Zephorien, was heating up the frozen grass in their backyard, trying to make it grow again. Upon seeing Lily, the Hebridean Black with piercing red eyes whipped his tail around so that Lily could grab hold of it and then deposited the redhead on his back. Keeping uncannily still, Zephyr allowed Al to hand Remy to his sister and let Teddy hop on by climbing up the dragon's hind leg. Remy clapped as Zephyr started to flap his wings and took off from the ground, catching Al in his talons jokingly.

Another Christmas tradition involved the four Potter siblings heading to Diagon Alley for some last-minute gift shopping on the twenty-third. The tradition had clearly changed a bit, but some changes, Lily decided, were good.

The ride was as freeing as it was cold, and shopping witches and wizards were pointing up in the air as Zephyr landed in front of Gringott's. Remy seemed to like the audience they'd accumulated and she hadn't stopped laughing through her pink scarf the whole way there. Now, Teddy was sliding down Zephyr's scales with Remy sitting on his shoulders, asking his daughter, "You want to go see Grandpa Bill?"

Remy continued to laugh even as Teddy put her down and held her hand while walking up the steps to the bank. He'd meet up with Al and Lily later. After Al gave Zephyr some meat treat and told the dragon to fly around for a while, he and Lily started walking toward Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes.

Christmas had never been Lily's favorite holiday, but even she had to admit that there was something special about everything being lit up. Strings of lights moved and flashed along the roof of every shop, and artificial snow covered the cobblestone paths stained with spilled hot chocolate and squealing with peppermint toads.

"Well, one thing's for certain," Al said as they took it all in, "this Christmas will at least be better than last."

Lily looked up at the purple building whose doorway was made of a magically moving Weasley mascot, grimaced at the thought of seeing Fred and Roxanne inside, and said, "I dunno' about that. Be careful what you wish for, Ally McNally."

"Yeah, yeah," Al teased her, pushing her shoulder to make her move toward the entrance. She hadn't told them about her row with the Gryff Group, but he must have sensed something was wrong. "Get in there, Hillbilly Lily."

The store wasn't as packed as it was every August, but business was still booming and all the Christmas items were on special. Al went straight for the sweets section to find stocking stuffers for Harry, but Lily's eyes were caught on the Broom Broom Kit by the register. Only an employee Lily didn't recognize was working, so Lily thought it safe to go over and inspect the modified broomstick with its rocket booster on the backside.

Wildfire Whiz-bangs were exploding over Lily's head when she heard a quiet voice say from behind her, "You don't need the rocket booster. You're plenty fast as it is."

Lily shut her eyes tight to hold back tears and sighed with relief. She turned around to face Roxanne and said, "You're speaking to me. Why?" She wasn't being accusatory; she was surprised, because for the last few weeks at Hogwarts Lily's only friend had been Kenna, even though she'd attempted to apologize to Roxy and her bodyguards multiple times.

Roxy smiled as she turned around to pick up the fallen explosives. "Because it's Christmas. And because you need me more than I need you."

She was right. Lily did need her; she needed her friend, her cousin, her _family_. Lily had never thought about her being the needy one in her friendship with Roxanne, but now that she heard it she didn't mind it so much.

"That doesn't mean I can convince Hugo or my brother to forgive you, though," said Roxanne. "And Fred's here somewhere right now, so you might not want him to see you."

"Right," said Lily, "I'll go to a different shop." It was the least she could do.

"Lily, wait!" Roxy called after as Lily left to find Al. She shifted on her feet, looking nervous, when she asked, "Why are you friends with her? With Kenna."

Lily couldn't look Roxanne in the eyes, but she made herself answer to the creaking wooden floor, "She just gets it, you know? She's been there."

The last thing she heard Roxy say, still not looking her in the eyes, was, "Yeah. I guess I'm just sorry I haven't."

Lily found Al looking at love potions and they left together after Al paid full price for his gifts; their uncle George had never been one for family discounts. Once back outside, Al asked if Lily needed more wolfsbane and suggested they go to the Apothecary next. She agreed, following him mindlessly down the road.

The Apothecary was all the way at the other end, beside the Leaky Cauldron. Lily and Al were quiet most of the way there, but Lily kept noticing her brother glancing behind them, as if paranoid that someone might be following the pair. "You know the war's over, right?" Lily asked when she started to get concerned for Al. "You don't have to keep watching your back, or mine."

Al had helped Lily in countless ways last year, through her werewolf transformations and threats from the enemy. He had also been the one to accidentally send the spell that killed James, but Lily had forgiven him for that a long time ago, knowing he'd never fully forgive himself.

Al looked at his sister and she could feel the green of his eyes. They had always been the strongest part of him, and the only honest part. "It's not that," he told her, "it's Ilana. We made this silly promise to each other at the wedding, and I can't get it out of my head."

Ilana Higgs, mysterious Muggle-born beauty with a proclivity for potions, had been the love of Al's life. Al and Lily were walking into the Apothecary as Lily asked, "What did you promise?"

"Well, we knew we needed to take some time away from each other," he said while gasping at the price of a century-old Bezoar. "But we promised that one day, once we were both free, we'd find each other again… here, in Diagon Alley."

"So, you keep looking behind you to see if she's there?"

Al shrugged, guilty as charged.

Lily shook her head. "Well, it sounds to me like you haven't fulfilled an important part of your promise." She handed him a vial of bat wings.

Al looked at her and furrowed his eyebrows in question.

"You've just been staying home with Mum since September, right?" asked Lily. Before Al could answer yes, Lily added, "That's not exactly free. I mean, I know you're taking care of Mum and all, but you're the one who convinced Dad to take the job at Hogwarts. When are you going to start taking your own advice and-"

"Get my own job?" Al finished for her.

"Well, yeah, essentially."

Al stopped walking for the first time since they'd entered the shop, and Lily could just barely see a twinkle in his eyes amidst the ominously dark lighting. "For your information," he said, "I have been helping Mum with her Quidditch work. And I start Auror training with Mercy in January."

Lily was impressed and, though she'd never admit it, immensely proud.

"Hey," said Al, carefully weaving through the shelves on his way to the register, "I have to make a detour to a jewellery shop on the Muggle side, but you want to take claim of the Quidditch gifts this year?"

"Sure," Lily said, re-buttoning her coat to prepare for the cold. Teasingly, she asked, "Jewellery store?"

"It's a favor for a friend," said Al, rolling his eyes.

Lily harrumphed and asked, "What friends?"

She was halfway out the door when she felt the sliminess of a bat wing hit the back of her head.

When Lily walked into the Quidditch Supplies Shop, her favorite store in the whole of Diagon Alley, there was a queue of people all waiting for something that Lily couldn't see in the back room, black jerseys in most of their hands. She had to shimmy through the line to get to the newly arrived broomsticks. She'd heard rumors about the Firebolt finally being renovated for 2025, but she'd yet to see the model, nor hear its name.

At first, all she saw were rows upon rows of Cleansweeps and Nimbus brooms, including the bright red Nimbus 2021 that her cousin Rose had been given a few years ago. Then she saw the Falcon Flyer, one of the top five fastest brooms in the world, but there were no Firebolts.

"Vroom vroom," said a child's voice from the display window. Lily turned toward the voice and found a chubby little girl about a year younger than Remy hiding in the corner and pointing up at the display of a brand new import. The girl ran off as soon as Lily saw her, escaping for the back room. Lily's eyes followed her, noticing the too-big jersey with the number one hanging past her hands, and she now had a better view of where the queue was headed. There were two Quidditch players at the line's end, both wearing Montrose Magpies uniforms and signing memorabilia for the shoppers. Lily would have jetted for the line if she hadn't been preoccupied by the display above her head.

The broom looked much like its predecessor, with a goblin-made iron frame and a golden polish along the handle. Something was different about it, though, and as Lily stood on her toes for a closer look, she brushed her hand over the wood and realized that it wasn't ebony like her Firebolt. It was rosewood. Where the word 'Firebolt' was engraved on her broom, this one said 'Phoenixbolt' beside the number seven. A tag hung from the wood, and Lily didn't need to read it to know that it was a reserved order.

This was why Al had wanted her to visit the shop and make the discovery herself. He had inherited James's wand, and this broom was made of the same wood, named after the same core. It was Al's design, and it was for her.

* * *

The walk to the Bird's Nest felt like the longest journey of Lysander's life. It was freezing outside and the sun had just set, so as Lysander waited for Luna, Neville, and Holly to stop by all of the Snargaluff plants, he looked up at the stars and pretended he was using them to navigate to some far-off destination. He thought of Harper and her world maps and he found himself wishing he could see what the night sky looked like down in the southern hemisphere, from Australia or Africa, even the tip of the South Pole. He remembered most of the southern constellations from Astronomy classes at Hogwarts: Canis Major and Phoenix and Sagittarius. Corvus, the crow, was one of the hardest to find even on a star map, and Lysander remembered tracing its four principal stars above Hydra, beside the Crater cup. The Greek myth of Corvus told of a raven's feathers painted black as a punishment for being unfaithful, but Lysander preferred the legend of Corvus and Crater, a thirsty bird and full cup both pitched into the sky, close enough to need each other but forever out of reach.

Suddenly Holly was calling Lysander's name from up ahead, and he realized that he was just as much to blame for getting distracted as his mother was; that was a trait he was guaranteed to inherit, because both of his parents had been exceedingly absentminded. Luckily, he caught up with them quickly and was soon approaching the familiar Bird's Nest for a holiday dinner.

The Weasley house was similar to the Rook only in height, with three floors each larger than the ones Lysander had grown up in. There was a porch out front that connected a stone pathway to the dusty driveway and old garage where Ron stored his flying car, barren maple trees popping up sporadically throughout the yard. The walls of the house looked like driftwood, their edges smooth but un-varnished, shaped by the turbulence of the past and sturdy for an unpredictable future.

There were many defensive spells Hermione kept up around the house, but Luna and Neville were able to walk right through, Luna dragging in Lysander by the arm and Neville Holly, because they were still technically part of the Order of the Phoenix's core alliance. Neville knocked on the door and it opened to Hermione, who embraced her old friend without a moment's hesitation.

Ron was in the entryway as well, and after the hosts greeted all their guests, Lysander and his family were pulled inside and Holly found her friend Colin Creevey waiting by the staircase. Hugo and Nigel must have been around somewhere as well, but it wasn't either of them Lysander was eager and slightly anxious to see. Handing his coat to Hermione gratefully, Lysander took off down the hallway to look for Rose.

He found her and her new husband huddled together on a lounge chair in the living room. Rose and Scorpius were flipping through some book under the lights of the Weasleys' beautifully decorated Christmas tree, in the half of the room that was filled with Quidditch memorabilia and moving family portraits: the golden trio on Platform 9¾ after their first year of Hogwarts, Fred and George at the opening of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, a young Hermione at her Hogwarts graduation and James at his, some older couple pulling a tooth out of a toddler Rose's mouth, Hugo laughing atop Ron's shoulder, Rose with Ron in the Auror office for her first day of work. The other half of the room was piled with books and centered by a stone fireplace, where the usual four stockings were hanging alongside three new ones – one for each of the orphan strays that would forever be a part of the Weasley family.

"_Babbity Rabbity?"_ Scorpius was asking Rose, who was sitting in his lap and reading the first page of an old picture book.

"Don't judge," Rose teased, "it's a classic!" They had yet to notice Lysander standing behind the tree.

"Yeah, you'd probably like it, Scorpius," said Lysander, revealing himself. "It's one of the earliest literary mentions of Animagus. Babbity Rabbity could be the mascot of your new school."

Scorpius laughed as Rose jumped up to hug Lysander, and Lysander was pleased to see that Rose was just as healed as she'd been at the wedding, just as strong and just as beautiful, only now with a bit of a tan around her darkened freckles. She let him go quickly so as not to make Scorpius uncomfortable, and Lysander shook Scorpius's hand firmly.

"So you heard about the school?" asked Scorpius, his hand on Rose's back. They were dressed casually, but Lysander couldn't help but notice that they were matching, Rose in a light blue sweater and Scorpius an ice blue collared shirt.

"Yeah, I'm a Ravenclaw," said Lysander. "I read." The announcement of Scorpius's School for Animagi had been in the newspaper for weeks now.

"Hey, Slytherins read too, you know," Scorpius defended himself.

"Just not classic fairy tales of sisterhood and revenge."

Scorpius had no defense this time, but Lysander understood that it was his parents, not his education, who had failed to verse Scorpius in the usual staples of a magical upbringing. "Anyway," said Scorpius, "what I mean is that I read about the Falcons match, and I'm sorry about your loss. It was uncalled for."

That meant a lot coming from Scorpius, the only Seeker who'd ever beat James at Hogwarts and who'd been recruited by the Falmouth Falcons even after he'd lost his magic. Lysander nodded in thanks and watched Rose smile beside her husband.

It took less strength than Lysander thought it would for him to say, "You two look really happy. I didn't get a chance to say it at the wedding, but congratulations. You deserve each other, in the best way."

"Thank you, Lysander," said Rose.

A moment of awkward silence passed before Ron yelled from the adjacent kitchen, "Scorpius, chess tournament in five minutes!" Last time Lysander had eaten at the Weasleys', Neville had attempted to help Hermione cook, and it had taken a very long time to get any food on the table. Ron must have known this too, and wanted to play chess to pass the waiting time and get him out of the kitchen.

Scorpius asked if Lysander wanted to join, but Lysander declined, knowing too well how competitive Ron and Hugo were. Instead, he chose to go for a walk, and when the boys started setting up the chess table in the living room, Rose decided she'd like to escape for a while as well.

They walked together around the yard and toward the back woods, where a murder of crows was foraging along a narrow creek. Rose picked up a flat stone and skipped it on the water for four perfect jumps as she asked, "So, how are you?"

"I'm all right, I guess," he said, "I've got some new roommates who seem surprisingly okay, and Neville's really helping Mum out, I think."

Rose took his arm and he flinched. "No, Lysander, how are _you_?"

This is why he had loved her. The way Rose looked at people, with her kind, watery eyes so wide and so wise, made them feel like they were the luckiest people in the world. She cared about everyone, wanted to know everything. She was the best listener he had ever met, but it also made it difficult to know just how much he meant to her when she'd sound this concerned for anyone even remotely close to her. Rose made everyone _feel_ special, even the ones who weren't.

"I don't know," Lysander answered honestly. "Sometimes I feel okay, really, and other times I want to scream. Lately, all I can think about is what I could have done-"

"You did everything," Rose interrupted before he could say any more, go any further. "You did _everything_ you could. We all did."

Lysander nodded, trying to stop himself from spewing out words that might hurt Rose. But she had asked him for the truth, and so he would give it to her. "Lucy blames me," he said.

Lucy was Rose's cousin, one of her closest friends, so Lysander wasn't surprised when Rose defended her, saying, "No, she doesn't."

"She threw her engagement ring at my face and told me I'm not a brother anymore!"

Rose looked at him and shook her head. "You are a brother, Lysander. You'll _always_ be a brother, to both of them. But Lucy _doesn't_ blame you."

"Then why'd she do it?"

Rose took a minute to respond. Finally, she shrugged and said, "You look like him."

And that was all he needed to hear. Lysander wasn't sure why it had taken him so long to understand that Lucy didn't blame him for Lorcan's death, or hate him for being the one who got to live. She loved him. She looked at him and saw the man she still loved, and had to remind herself with every look that Lysander wasn't Lorcan, that Lorcan was dead. It was like she was dreaming, and every time she saw him she had to wake up. Lysander knew what that was like; he felt it whenever he saw his reflection in the mirror.

Reminded of someone else who saw Lorcan in him, Lysander found himself telling Rose about how he'd led on Evelyn at the Meyer Lemon by allowing her to believe that he was Lorcan. When he finished telling the story, he added, "I'm still not sure why I did that."

Rose stopped skipping stones and blew on her hands to warm them up. Then she said, "I was talking to Al the other day about why James's death had made him return to the Order. He said that when he had to say goodbye to his brother, he felt as though he was left with a choice, and it wasn't really about Flock or Order anymore. It was about honoring his brother, and everyone who'd died. He could shut down, act out, rebel, and be angry with the world for taking James from him. _Or_ he could live the way James would if he could. He could help save me.

"I think you liked being Lorcan because you always thought he was the better twin, and for that moment with the bartender, you got to live out some of his life for him. You were choosing to be better."

She was right. Rose was usually right, but now she was spot on. And because she had been so wise for him, he decided he would try to be the same for her. "Did you get a chance to say goodbye to James, like Al did? I know you weren't there when he died, but do you remember the last words you said to him?"

"Yes," she said smiling, without a moment's hesitation. "He was stealing gifts at the wedding. I think I told him to stop, and he made some stupid comment. And then – I'm not sure how we got to it – he was telling me that I was brilliant. The last thing I said to him was, 'I love you.' Then you showed up and stole him away."

Lysander remembered. He had interrupted them because Holly had requested to speak with James about something, and then Lysander had danced with Rose for a single song. "Yeah," he said, "I think that's the last time I spoke to him as well." But he hadn't told James he loved him like Rose had. He wished he could now.

But he could still do something for Lorcan. After Holly came running to tell the two that dinner was ready and then ran back to the house, Lysander stopped Rose from following for just a minute, unclasping the sapphire ring from around his neck and handing it to her. "Give it back to Lucy, and tell her welcome to the family. She'll know what it means."

* * *

"The food's delicious, Vic," said Harry, praising Victoire's cooking.

Everyone at the table nodded in agreement, from Lily with her mouth full of Christmas ham, to Teddy who sat across from her and squeezed his wife's shoulder, to Ginny at the head across from Harry, whose nod was almost imperceptible as her eyes refused to look anywhere but down. Lily had been rather worried about Ginny over the past few days, but Al had reassured her that their mother was making progress. She was writing Quidditch columns again, though only for the British-Irish League, and she smiled sometimes when no one was looking.

"Thank you," said Victoire. "I'm afraid Remy may have thrown in a bit too much salt, but-"

"It's perfect," Teddy reassured her, but Victoire was looking at Dominique's nearly empty plate. Al was sitting in between Lily and her cousin, but Lily could feel the vibrations caused by Dom's shaking feet making their way from the floor into Lily's chair. Dominique was anxious about something.

When Victoire finally looked away, she pushed her seat from the table to stand and said, "I'd like to say a few words, actually, if I may."

She was looking at Harry for permission, and he raised both his hands for her.

"This Christmas is hard for all of us," she started, clearing her throat. "It's hard to have to celebrate a holiday on the same night that commemorates a horrible battle that was filled with so many horrible deaths. I wasn't there, I-I wasn't at Hogwarts at this time last year, so I can't say what it was like. But I do know how it feels to celebrate on a day of death. I get that, because I was born on the anniversary of the first Battle of Hogwarts, and every year my birthday falls on the same day that Teddy lost his parents, the same day that my father and Ginny lost their brother, the same day that my old school was knocked to the ground. And I remember asking my father why I had to have been born on such an awful day, and I remember him saying to me, 'Oh, Vicky, it wasn't all awful. We lost that day, but we won, too. And you weren't named for that loss; you were named for the victory.'"

Teddy was holding Victoire's hand, and Harry and Ginny were crying, because they'd fought and lost and won in both wars. They managed to smile through their tears by the time Victoire continued with, "I'm not going to pretend to know James anywhere near as well as you all did, but I do think he'd want us to celebrate on this night, and tomorrow. He'd want us to revel in his talent and in his victory, so I just want to say now what I suspect he'd say to me if he were sitting here tonight, and that's Happy Bloody Christmas, everybody."

Dom was the first to start a symphony of clapping, and for a moment she was no longer anxious, just happy and proud. As Victoire sat back down, Teddy leaned over and kissed her cheek, but as he settled back into his seat he stared at Lily so intently that she thought she might fall off of hers. When she looked back at him, she realized that he wasn't meeting her eyes exactly, but was focused farther in the distance. Turning around to face the wall window and glass screen door that led to the back porch, she saw Zephyr pounding his back feet against the ground like an excited child, a hooded figure by his side with the shadow of a crow.

Al was the next to notice Teddy and Lily's stares, and he looked behind and whispered immediately, "Knox."

The name made Dominique leap from her chair, and both she and Al were running for the back door to let the Animagus and Forbidden Flock traitor inside. He embraced Al first, Dominique frozen from shock, and Lily hadn't seen her brother this thrilled in years.

"Rookie," Al was saying, patting his friend on the back.

"Black Hawk," Knox said to him, whispering something in his ear that Lily couldn't quite hear.

Al nodded and, as if permitted to, Knox turned to Dominique, whom Lily was now realizing looked especially beautiful tonight. Dom had always been gorgeous, with wavy blonde locks of hair that framed her face like water around a breeching whale. Her turquoise eyes were beaming above a white lace dress that was the exact opposite of Knox's aura of darkness. She must have known he was coming; Lily could tell when a girl was dressing to impress.

"Do you still?" Knox asked her, the rest of the Potters glued to their seats and watching from afar like they were at the Muggle cinema.

"Yes," said Dom through a flood of tears. Then she shuffled through the pocket of her blue blazer and took out a ring with a red stone that looked to Lily like sea glass.

Dom showed the ring to Knox and he asked, "Will you say yes?"

"Yes."

Then they were kissing, their lips jammed against each other so that they could barely move. They wanted to be as close together as possible, every part of their bodies touching through their layers of clothes, Knox's arms around Dom's shoulders and her hands clinging to the back of his jacket collar. That was how Lily hoped to be kissed one day – like a stellar collision that, if separated, would leave nothing but a black hole in its place.

Even when their lips parted, Knox's forehead was still connected to Dom's. Their eyes were closed and she was asking him, "Tonight?"

He finally leaned away, her body instinctively leaning forward to follow him, to ask, "Can we? Don't we need a priest? Or at least one of those officiate people."

Lily was trying to figure out what the couple was talking about when Al answered for her by tapping Teddy on the shoulder and saying, "Present. I officiated Rose and Scorpius's wedding, and I think I remember most of the words."

"And rings?" Knox asked, turning back to Dom.

Dom smiled and Al pulled two wedding bands from his pant pocket, saying, "I've got those too. Dom asked me to pick them up in London yesterday."

Knox looked back and forth between Al and Dom, and Lily shrunk into her seat to make sure he didn't see her. She didn't know if Knox was aware of who killed his sister, but even if he wasn't, Lily didn't want him to find out.

His eyes settled back on Dom, and she hadn't stopped smiling since he walked in. "I love you," she said to him.

He said, "I love you back."

Al howled through cupped hands and Teddy stood from his chair, clapping and announcing, "All right, folks – looks like we've got a wedding to make."

Within minutes, Teddy had taken on the role of Best Man and Victoire Maid of Honor, and Harry was writing to Bill and Fleur and Ginny was getting flowers and everything was happening all at once and nobody noticed when Lily slipped out the front door.

* * *

It was late Christmas Eve night, and Lysander wasn't quite sure why he'd agreed to accompany his mother and Neville to St. Mungo's for a visit to the latter's crazy parents. Holly had been acting weird since coming home from the Weasleys' last night, so she'd opted out of the trip and maybe Lysander felt obliged to be supportive of his step-father. Or maybe he just wanted to get away from the house that, in his mind at least, still belonged to Lorcan.

The hospital had far too many patients inside for the holidays. Lysander had heard before that the holidays were, for many people, the most stressful time of the year and that hospitals were often teeming with patients because of it, but Lysander rejected that theory. If Christmas was the most magical time of the year, then it should have been the safest too, because magic was far more healing than it was destructive.

Lysander followed Luna and Neville through the first floor in search of an elevator that would take them upstairs, and they had to push through myriad crowds of wizards with burnt noses and stung arms in the Dai Llewellyn Ward for creature-induced injuries. Healers in lime green robes were practically running from patient to patient, and as Lysander passed the wing for werewolf bites he thought he recognized one whose eyes matched her uniform. There was no time to say hello, though, because if he slowed for a moment he'd lose track of his own companions.

After a very claustrophobic ride in the elevator, the family made it to the fourth floor, and this ward – reserved for patients of spell damage – was far less populated. Lysander understood by the slow, sombre mood sweeping across the floor that this was where they kept the patients who couldn't be cured.

There was a very stoic and sterile-looking Healer waiting outside the door to the Longbottom couple's room. Her grey hair was pulled back in a tight bun, and she had small, beady eyes that looked as if they never intended to open fully again. She was curt but concerned when she shook Neville's hand in the hallway and asked, "Are you sure you want to do this?"

"Yes," he said, reaching out for Luna's hand. "It's time."

Then the Healer opened the door and walked inside. Neville followed, and Lysander saw a flash of two scaly white bodies on plainly made beds. He grabbed his mother's arm before Luna could walk inside, asking her in a whisper as the door closed, "What's going on? This isn't just the annual Christmas visit, is it?"

Luna didn't say anything. She just looked at him, and he understood. Lysander understood that Neville was about to say goodbye to his parents forever.

As Lysander backed away and his back hit the opposite wall, Luna's eyes followed his worriedly. "He can't do this," said Lysander, curling his fists and wishing he could hit something. "He can't kill them! People all over this hospital are fighting to be alive and Neville's just going to pull the cord on his _parents?"_

Luna had her hands clasped together in front of her, as calm as Lysander was raging. "It's not your decision," she said.

"Oh, just like it wasn't my decision to let Lucy change her name?" Lysander was raising his voice now, and was thankful this floor was so empty. He was pushing off the wall and pointing at Luna as he yelled, "I would give _ANYTHING_ to see Lorcan again, or James, even for a _second_. He doesn't know what he's about to give up in there!"

Lysander had his hands against the other wall now, with Luna locked in between them, trapped. She put her own hands on his arms and said steadily, "Lysander, son, do you remember when you were young and I yelled at you for taking your father away from me?"

It had been just like this, only Lysander had been the one pinned up against the wall in their kitchen, and Luna had caged him in. Even then, almost a decade ago, he'd been tall enough to meet her eyes, and he remembered how crazed they looked. He didn't want to believe that his might look just as crazed right now.

He nodded slowly and Luna asked, "Do you remember what you told me to make me stop?"

Lysander repeated the words in his head, then said them exactly as he remembered. "It wasn't Rolf I took away from you. Rolf left you a long time ago. He left all of us." Rolf had gone insane before Lysander had sent him to Azkaban. So had Neville's parents, before they'd come here.

"That's right," said Luna as Lysander lowered his arms. "You were right. It's time to move on, Lysander. It's time."

Lysander nodded and backed away so that Luna could head inside the patient room, but he did not follow her. He did not agree. He did not move on. Instead, he returned to the elevator and waited for it to deliver him into the crowd once more.

* * *

Lily was sitting on a bench in the village square when it started to snow. She was looking up at the Potter memorial, staring at the statue of her grandparents holding her infant father as their heads were slowly topped with white. She wondered why Harry had wanted to settle here, where his parents were killed, where _he_ had nearly been killed. It was impossible to escape them here, just like it was impossible for Lily to escape James, or to escape her own guilt.

When she felt like she was paralyzed by the cold, Lily got up to walk again, and she headed down Church Lane without any destination in mind, her footsteps leaving no trace as the snow covered them. She gazed up at the moon in the hopes that it might tell her where to go, but for the moment it was covered by the clouds. Only the stars were visible on this darkest of nights, and so she followed the brightest one into the graveyard behind Clementine Church.

She finished off the last of Al's firewhiskey as she opened the gate. The stained glass window in the back of the church reflected off the snow like Christmas lights, in colors of red and gold and green. The tombstones were old and their rows out of line, families connected as chaotically in death as they must have been in life.

Lily passed quite a few names she recognized – Ariana Dumbledore, Ignotus Peverell, Hannah Abbott – before she made it to the graves she was looking for. Lily nearly had the wind knocked out of her when she saw fresh flowers leaning against the marble grave, and only caught her breath at the sight of the boy who had surely produced them sitting on the tombstone's other side. His hair was only slightly brighter than the snow he was half-buried under, and his eyes were frozen on the middle distance.

"What are you doing here, Lysander?" asked Lily, walking around to face him. A James Potter was buried here, true, but that wasn't _their_ James. And Lily was fairly certain that Lysander's twin brother Lorcan had been buried with the Weasleys at the church in Ottery St. Catchpole.

He didn't seem surprised to see her, and she supposed he was used to having her creep up on him in the darkness. "It's just," he started to say, "it's been exactly a year now, and everyone's moving on, letting go, but I can't. I _can't_ forget them. And it doesn't matter that their graves aren't here, because I don't want to feel closer to them, not really. I just want to remember that this is who they are now: just stones in the ground, next to other stones in the ground that are supposed to be their family. I need to remember that _I'm_ their family, but that I'm _not_ just a stone in the ground. I'm alive."

Lily sat down across from him, not caring about her dress or stockings getting wet or frozen. For a while, she just looked at him, trying to take in every detail of his face that the stars would let her see. She looked at his square jaw with its glimmers of hair poking out of his dimpled chin like needles, and she looked at his eyes, set deep into their sockets like they were either hiding from the world or screaming to be seen. She tried to make her own eyes scream back as she asked, "What's it like to lose a twin?"

His expression didn't change, his forehead didn't wrinkle and his brows didn't furrow, when he answered, "It's awful. It's exactly what you'd expect it to be – lonely, excruciating, unnatural… Why?"

"Ryder Rookwood was a twin," said Lily, not needing to explain Ryder's significance to the boy who'd been there when Lily had killed her. "Her brother married my cousin tonight, but I killed his twin sister."

Lysander didn't say anything, but he didn't need to. Lily knew that he understood, possibly better than anyone else could. He most definitely had a few months ago, when she'd woken up in his flat in Montrose, staring at those deep-set eyes that seemed to both scare and comfort her. She felt drawn to both feelings, which was why she asked him now, "Can I tell you a secret?"

He thought for a long time before he answered, almost as if he knew that this was something she wouldn't tell just anyone, like he wanted to make sure he was worthy enough to hear it, loyal enough to keep it. Eventually he said, "Yes."

Lily knew that what she was about to say would be some of the most selfish words she'd ever spoken, but something told her that Lysander was selfish too. He wanted to hold onto James forever, just like she did. But she also thought that her words would be honest, and that if they both just admitted what it was they were actually feeling, then maybe things could be different. Maybe they _could_ move on, even if at a slower pace than the people around them. Maybe they could be slow together.

Lily's stomach howled and Lysander looked up as if he could hear it. His eyes met hers and she said, "I don't want to be alone."

* * *

_**Note: **What did you think? Was it nice to see some old folks again (it was super fun for me, haha)? Let me know in a review! Spoilers for the next chapter can be found on my profile as usual, but I wanted to say here that this is a turning point for both Lily and Lysander, and their grief will be a little less obvious (though still very much present within them) in the coming chapters._

_Thanks for reading!_

_-Hailey_


	4. Camelopardalis

_**Note:** Sorry that this is a day late; hopefully you saw my warning about that. Anyway, this chapter turned out to be a lot more personal than I expected, and I think it's my favorite so far, so I hope you like it as much as I do. Happy reading!_

_-Hailey_

* * *

**4 – Camelopardalis **

In winter, everything was dry. Lysander's fir wand was peeling and his new Phoenixbolt – sent especially to the Montrose Magpies by the owners of the broomstick company themselves – had to be constantly humidified. His lips were cracked and most mornings he had to pry his eyes open, their lashes stuck together like congealed beans left out for the night. The dryness made the air colder, the wind sharper, much like the wet made the summer hotter, the rain heavier. Lysander wondered why the seasons were so backwards, and why two things as simple as temperature and precipitation couldn't just come together the way they needed each other.

Lysander shivered beneath his black coat, watching spears of ice fall from The Creel Seafoods sign and shatter on the walkway of the hidden pub. Evey rushed out the front door to clear the way, throwing a bucket of salt on the ice and looking up only to meet Lysander's eyes from across the street. He waved and, though he couldn't quite see her face through the morning frost, hoped she smiled.

"Blimey, 'Sander, you look positively frigid," said Harper's voice from behind him.

He turned around to see her walking out the door from their apartment, wearing nothing but a thin blue jacket and a black beany that made her hair look even whiter. She had an extremely high tolerance for the cold and wasn't afraid to remind Lysander of this every chance she got.

"That's because it _is _positively frigid," Lysander said as Erick opened the door, beginning to cross the street and lead the way to the Quidditch pitch for their early practice.

Erick was spewing out German faster than Lysander could think to a small metal contraption attached to his ear. Glancing behind him, Lysander saw Erick roll his eyes and the former asked Harper, "What's he doing?"

"He wanted to use my mobile to call some shoe company in Germany," she said. "That's why we took so long to get out of the house."

"Huh," said Lysander, having forgotten that Harper was a Muggle-born and so had been raised using telephones for communication. "What's wrong with the shoes he has?"

"Hell if I know," said Harper.

"Oi!" called someone from up ahead. Henry was just jogging onto the sidewalk by the council chamber building where he dropped off his wife every morning. "Keep up, you lot! Or can't you walk and talk at the same time?"

Lysander, Harper, and Erick ran to catch up to Henry and then walked with him all the way to the stadium locker room, where Liam was leaning against the bulletin board and sorting through a stack of official-looking papers. Lysander headed for his locker, pausing when Liam said without looking up, "Don't get changed just yet, Twenty-one. We've got some announcements first."

Harper was sitting on the bench farthest from Liam, and Lysander joined her there as Grady and Pierre stumbled inside, Erick behind them with his eyes far more enlarged than Lysander had seen them before. He'd waited outside to finish his call, and now practically threw the phone at Harper as he hunched onto the bench, muttering words Lysander didn't understand but that he suspected were German swears.

"All right, Magpies," started Liam once everyone was settled, "it's a new year."

"Wooo, twenty twenty-five!" screamed Grady in celebration, his arms raised into the air. Both Liam and Harper looked at him with furrowed eyebrows that made Grady shut up, his eyes falling to the floor.

Liam moved on and said, "The winter season continues until April, as usual, and in May the European Championship begins. We automatically qualify because of our win two summers ago, but after the Falcons failure, we _need_ to keep our ranking up."

Grady looked at Henry accusingly at that, but Henry paid him no mind. He was focused on what Liam was about to say, and Lysander understood why when the captain added, "And I don't want us to lose that focus, even for the sake of the upcoming National Team try-outs."

Henry was smiling then and Grady was squeezing Pierre's giant shoulders. Pierre had been the only Magpie to play for the English National Team in 2022, though Liam could have easily made it if he had tried to. Clearly, Henry coveted a spot more than Liam ever had. Grady and Erick were international, so they would have to try out for their own teams, which left only Lysander and Harper to decide if they should start preparing for September try-outs. Lysander looked at Harper to see if she was entertaining the idea, but he face was completely blank.

"Is that clear, Twenty-one?" asked Liam suddenly.

Lysander looked away from Harper and said to Liam, "Yeah. Yes. Very clear."

"Good, because I've got a big day for you." Liam moved to the side to reveal a collage of moving pictures stuck to the bulletin board. Each one featured the beautiful female players of the Holyhead Harpies, most of them focused on the two blondes holding Beater bats. "Harpies Beater twins, Beatrice and Eugenie Bowen. These are our biggest threats in the match next week. They may look small and pretty, but they are _not_ afraid of blood, and they play in perfect unison."

Harper gulped beside Lysander. She and Henry flew on the wings of the pitch, so they were typically the must vulnerable to Bludger hits. Liam explained that they would be spending the morning on defense drills before he headed out and let everyone change. They reconvened in the air, Erick grimacing as he took off from the frozen pitch in his apparently inadequate trainers.

They flew ten laps around the pitch to warm up before Liam called out positions for the first drill. "Three, by the hoops!" he said, Pierre doing as he was told. "You'll be catching all the rogue Bludgers and sending them forward."

Then Liam paired the winged Chasers with their respective Beaters, Harper with Lysander on the east and Henry with Liam on the west. Grady and Erick were given spare Beater bats and were asked to hit Bludgers at the two Chasers as hard as they possibly could.

"Has he gone barmy?" Lysander asked Harper, who had nothing to defend herself with but him.

"Believe it or not," said Harper, "I think this is him _trying._"

It was Grady's turn first, the other three hovering on the sidelines as they watched the Bear block Bludger after Bludger from hitting his sub-captain straight in the head. Grady would make a great Beater from what Lysander could tell, his hits strong and quick, but of course he could just be excited at the opportunity to put a dent in Henry's structured jawline.

However good Grady was, though, Liam was better. He wasn't just a shield for Henry; he was a bloody force field. He looked every oncoming Bludger in the eye and swung his whole back into each hit, sending them off with such force that a few almost knocked Pierre off his broom. Henry just laughed and gawked at Grady, yelling, "Can't touch me, can you, Sutter?"

Erick was flying a few meters behind Grady and said something to keep Grady from growing too frustrated, but then Grady seethed back at him, "No, Germ, I can do this!" Then he repeated to the rest of his teammates, "I CAN DO THIS!"

His determination would have been charming if it didn't require him wounding a fellow player, but it didn't matter anyway. His next hit, bigger and better than any other so far, just barely skimmed the tips of Henry's hair as it flew above him and into Pierre's arms.

"Time to switch off!" yelled Liam as Grady slumped over his broom in defeat. Lysander took his spot in front of Harper and Grady threw his bat to Erick. Lysander had expected Grady to fly off and take a breather in the locker room until the next drill, but instead the only one to do so was Liam. With one look over at Lysander and Harper, Liam shook his head and flew to the ground, putting Henry in charge while he was gone.

Harper watched him go and Lysander tried to meet her eyes to say, "Hey, I've got this. You know that, right?"

She smirked and said, "You better have."

Erick was far easier on them than Grady had been, even with Henry's words of violent encouragement. Lysander tried to focus on his new broom, which was faster than any other in the world, spinning circles around Harper so that he could hit away the Bludgers that screamed for her like winter's chill. His teeth chattered as he flew, but he clenched his jaw shut with every swing. He was made for this: made to be a soldier, _made_ to protect people, made to fight until the wood of his bat split in the dryness.

* * *

Lily wiped her tired eyes and then looked at her hands. They were soft and oily from a mixture of make-up and sweat. It was the dead of winter, but Lily hadn't ventured outside all day, too busy with classes and meetings now that she was back at Hogwarts. Her fingertips were painted with concealer that she'd put on her forehead hours ago, hoping to hide her December scars. The make-up hid her whorl-patterned fingerprints and weighed down her hands, but they weren't the only part of her that felt wet and heavy. She had to keep her eyes open because Lily knew that as soon as her lids closed they would release the flood of tears currently dammed in its ducts. Even the New Year couldn't stop her crying.

She was having another staring contest with herself as Roddy Matheson and Abby Chang-Turner argued over the foul that had ended the Hufflepuff vs. Slytherin match back in November. This was not the first Quidditch captains meeting Madam Bell had hosted since the match, but Abby, Slytherin's Seeker, was still defending her two new Beaters, claiming even hits to the head were fair game.

Bell was barely listening from her seat on the desk in front of the captains. "Look," she said irritably, "what's done is done. If in the next match we come across the same violence, we will re-examine."

When Roddy and Abby finally shut up, Abby sending Roddy a harmless pinching hex to keep him aggravated, Bell changed the subject. "I know it's been a hard holiday for all of us, so I'll let you get out of here. But I do want to reiterate that you need to maintain a consistent practice schedule, with at least three training times a week. I'd also like you to remind your players that they _must_ keep their grades up. Headmaster rules state that all house team players need to be passing every one of their classes, regardless of level, to stay on the team. That includes mid-terms, so I'll be contacting you all personally if any of your players must be dropped."

The weight of Lily's eyelids suddenly sunk to her stomach, burning like acid. She hadn't received all her mid-term grades yet, but this morning a stoic Professor Binns had flown her paper back with a giant 'D' stamped in its corner. Binns had announced that only one student in sixth year had done Outstanding work, and Hugo had practically displayed the 'O' on his paper from the seat beside Lily. She only hoped the History of Magic exam wasn't worth half her term's mark, like Transfiguration was.

Bell dismissed them and Lily headed to the greenhouses, shoving a slow Roddy out the door on her way. She was just passing the Transfiguration classroom when Kenna came skipping out and squeezed Lily's shoulders while squealing, "Oi! Where are you off to?"

"Er, I have Herbology now," said Lily, loosening the crimson tie around her neck.

"I'll walk with you," said Kenna, swerving through a group of young Ravenclaw girls pointing at Lily and whispering about the moon.

Grimacing, Lily attempted to ignore the girls and asked Kenna, "Hey, d'you reckon you could spare a bit of firewhiskey? I ran out half way through the holiday and now I can't stop sweating."

Kenna's eyes widened so that they were twice as large as Lily's and she nodded aggressively, saying, "Yeah, I'll bring a bottle to practice later."

"We don't have practice today." They were passing the double doors to the Great Hall, where Hugo and Roxanne were just finishing their lunch.

"Sure we do," said Kenna, not noticing Lily's friends. "You announced it yesterday, remember?"

Lily did not remember, but she said nonetheless, "Right, yeah, of course. Sounds like a plan."

"You okay?" asked Kenna, sensing something was wrong, even if Lily didn't know what it was any more than she did.

"I'm fine – brilliant, in fact," said Lily, turning toward the largest greenhouse where Professor Longbottom was pruning the vines of a Venomous Tentacula plant.

Kenna grabbed Lily's arm before the latter could head inside without her. Lily was glaring at her hand, and considered snarling at the brunette beauty for a moment, but looked up when Kenna opened her other hand to reveal three pearl-sized balls that appeared to pulse with her blood. "Look, these'll stop the shaking better than firewhiskey."

"Yeah?" asked Lily. "What am I supposed to do with a bunch of puking pastilles?"

Kenna laughed and said, "You're too cute."

This time, Lily really did snarl.

She didn't scare Kenna, though. "Let's just say that ou won't find these at Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. More like Knockturn Alley."

Something inside Lily sizzled, and she wasn't sure if it was fear or excitement. A smile slowly spread across her cheeks and she let Kenna pour the pills into her hand, then turned around and walked into the greenhouse.

Lily felt as though she was entering a rainforest as the hot mist engulfed her. She yearned for the crisp hail that ripped at the glass walls from outside, but she only felt small spells of its chill each time the door opened and more students piled in.

"Gather around, everyone!" said Professor Longbottom, using hands to hug at the air and pull it in to his chest as if he was sniffing a freshly cooked meal. The students shuffled closer to the table of toothsome plants reluctantly, dreading the body heat as much as the plant itself.

Lily was sandwiched between Holly and Hugo, the latter of whom was barricading his chest with his arms, his elbows jetting into Lily's shoulders and his head barely visible amidst the dense fog that was rising toward the ceiling. Hugo hadn't spoken to Lily since the card game, and had even been silent on Christmas morning when the Potters had opened gifts alongside the newly extended Weasley family.

"All right, so today and for most of this term we'll be dealing with the Venomous Tentacula!" Professor Longbottom said, his enthusiasm practically contagious. "But first thing's first, I'll be handing out your graded mid-terms."

A wave of groans passed through the crowd of students, though Lily's two neighbors straightened up as if excited. Neville started passing out the papers in alphabetical order, explaining as he went, "I'm quite pleased with your results. Suffice it to say, losing last year's spring term hasn't stopped a good deal of you from earning O's and E's on this mid-term, so your future O.W.L. exams are looking bright!"

He was turning to Holly when Lily felt the weight again; she worried she might pass out from heat stroke any second. Longbottom kissed Holly on the forehead as he handed back her mid-term, whispering so that only a few could hear, "Well done, kiddo'."

There were a few more tests to hand back before Lily's finally came, and though she had considered refraining from looking at her mark until she was ready, Professor Longbottom made this impossible by passing her the paper face-forward. He didn't even look at her as he passed straight to Hugo and then returned to the other side of the table. The letter on Lily's paper was a 'P' for Poor. She tore her eyes away quickly and glanced at Hugo's O, met his eyes that were peeking at her sheet, then crossed her arms just as he was uncrossing his.

The class lasted forever and Lily barely stayed awake. She was paired with Holly and assigned the task of clipping five leaves off the dangerous plant within the hour. Holly did most of the work without having to be asked, and Lily sat on her stool and swivelled around lazily until Holly grew frightened and Lily had to step in, snipping at the plant as if killing a spider. They had seven leaves by the time the class was dismissed, but Lily couldn't recall any of Professor Longbottom's instructions or hints about handling them; she'd merely had enough nerve to make anything possible.

Students were filing out of the greenhouse and breathing sighs of relief in the cool hallway when Professor Longbottom requested that Lily stay behind for a "chat." She sighed and took her sweater off yet again, fanning her chest and facing her family friend.

"How was your Christmas, Lily?" asked Longbottom, taking a seat in front of her.

"Fine," she shrugged.

"Hard, I imagine?" he asked. He had lost a stepson during the war, so Christmas was a grieving day for the Longbottoms as well as for the Potters.

Lily nodded, and Professor Longbottom looked more sympathetic than anyone in her family ever did. He had a kind face, she realized now: oval and even, his skin less worn from age than her father's was, a bald batch growing in the middle of his gray hair. "I can't imagine what it must be like to lose a sibling," he said. "Lysander puts up a strong wall, so I can't ever tell how broken he is."

Lily looked up at the mention of Lysander. She didn't say anything, though she did have something she _wanted_ to say – that Lysander was very broken, as broken as she was, possibly more. She suspected Lysander's grief was a better-kept secret than was her own, and for once Lily felt obligated to keep it.

"And the furry little problem, how's that going?" asked Professor Longbottom upon concluding that his last attempt at breaking Lily's wall wasn't going to work. "Been taking your brother's wolfsbane?"

"Yeah," said Lily. Deciding that Professor Longbottom couldn't possibly have the guts to discipline her if she was snarky toward him, she added, "Why do you want to know?"

"I'm your house head, Lily," he said, "your advisor. I care about your time here, at Hogwarts."

Lily furrowed her eyebrows, waiting for a better answer.

Eventually, Neville's eyes drooped and Lily knew she'd be getting one when he said, "I'm meant to report all failing grades to Harry so that he can speak with struggling students, but since you're his daughter and because I've been his friend for a long time, I'm choosing not to rat you out. I'm choosing to give you a chance, get your grades back up, keep playing Quidditch, and then wow your dad with incredible exam results this summer."

All Lily could think of to say was, "I'm not _failing_. I'm not doing well, but it's not like I'm-"

Longbottom held up his hands to interrupt. "I talked with Professor Ito today, and his exact words regarding your mid-term were, 'I gave her a D, and that was very generous of me.'"

The Transfiguration exams hadn't even been handed back yet, but Lily didn't have a hard time believing Professor Longbottom. She'd always struggled in Transfiguration about as much as she excelled in Defense Against the Dark Arts, and even in DADA she'd only earned an E this year.

"I suggest that you devote more of your time to your studies and perhaps ask a few of your classmates to help you along with your professors. Professor Ito offered to help you through your transformations, I'd be happy to meet with you and go over topics once or twice a week, and I'm sure Hugo would-"

She didn't hear the rest of Professor Longbottom's suggestion. She had grabbed her rucksack and was jetting out of the greenhouse in search for air. But once she made it to the hallway, she still felt just as heavy, still throbbed from the heat, still couldn't breathe. Sweat poured down her cheeks, settling on her lips. She tasted salt, clear and pure like snow, and knew that it wasn't sweat after all.

* * *

Lysander woke to the sound of sirens. Erick sent the alarm charm through the flat every morning, since he typically woke up early to run. (Why he ran even more than he had to, Lysander would never know.) It took a solid fifteen minutes for Lysander to actually make it out of his bed, which gave Harper time in the loo before Lysander stumbled out of his room, met her in the hallway, and yawned in her face.

"Ugh," she gagged behind an oversized T-shirt whose collar was held up around her mouth, "I don't know how you do it. I swear your breath gets more horrendous every morning."

Lysander smirked and blew cool air onto Harper's recently washed skin, whose acne scars were less evident when she'd had a good night's sleep. Harper ducked to avoid his breath and fought through his outstretched arms to get to her room, yelling, "Go blow yourself!" on her way.

Twenty minutes later, Lysander was still styling his hair in the bathroom and Harper was banging on the door. "Oi, do you have a spare pair of goggles?" she asked, louder than necessary. "Erick says the blizzard's coming in."

Of course game day would happen to fall on the coldest day of the season. Opening the door, Lysander pointed his wand at Harper's cheeks and added a motion charm to her painted face so that the magpies flew all the way around her eyes. "I'll check," he said, on his way back to his bedroom when Erick trudged down the hallway, Harper's mobile still plastered to his ear.

It had been a full week that Erick had done nothing but interrogate failing shoe companies in search of the perfect footwear, and every time Lysander or Harper tried to ask why Erick was so distraught they were either yelled at in a language neither understood or stared at blindly as if they didn't understand any language at all.

Lysander, who was still wearing nothing but the briefs he'd slept in, crossed his room and searched for one of the two cardboard boxes he stored under his bed. James's things were organized inside that box to an extent Lysander's own belongings had never seen, and so he knew where to reach in order to find James's goggles, their strap worn and dry. As he was pulling them out, though, his hand brushed against the smooth material of a jersey number, and soon Lysander was wearing James's jersey underneath his own. He was just about to push the box back beneath his bed when he had another idea.

Both Harper and Erick were in the kitchen now, eating eggs in two different ways. Lysander strolled into the room, glancing over at Erick's sofa where the pillows were lined up according to size and the blankets had been folded and stacked. He threw the goggles at the back of Harper's head and handed his compulsive roommate a pair of Adidas.

"They're James's old trainers," he said when Erick looked up at him, confused. "Not sure if they'll fit, but I do know they'll bring you good luck."

"I cannot-" Erick protested.

"You can," Lysander stopped him. Erick had finally put down the telephone and his cheeks flushed with embarrassment. Finally understanding, Lysander added, "I get it. We're all superstitious, mate."

Lysander magically scrambled the last three eggs and then followed Harper and Erick out of the flat, running all the way to the stadium to make it in time for warm-ups. Those only lasted half the usual time due to the cold, and the team huddled in the locker room while waiting for the start of the match. Not even a blizzard could cancel Quidditch.

As the Magpies were called onto the pitch, the wind was louder than the audience, who were surely roaring at a diminished caliber today. Lysander was at the back of the line, with only Liam behind him, and as he rubbed his goggles to rid of the fog he felt the captain's bat gently press against his shoulder. Still walking, Lysander turned his head and Liam said into his ear, "Don't worry about passing much today, you hear? We won't be able to see each other across the pitch. Just watch for the Bludgers and-"

"And?" asked Lysander when Liam paused, both his words and his legs. Lysander turned to face him and saw that Liam's stocky build looked small in the blizzard's blur, almost vulnerable.

"And if those twins get anywhere near _her_," he said, almost yelling to make sure Lysander heard, "_DESTROY_ them."

Lysander couldn't see Liam's face as the latter passed him and took the center spot in the starting circle, but something told Lysander that Liam's words were more than suggestive. They were an order.

From somewhere in the invisible stands, Bill Loudspeak was naming the players of each team. Lysander stood on Liam's right side and faced one of the blonde Beaters, whom Loudspeak had nicknamed BB for convenience, and he tried to see if she was as pretty as people claimed. Her sister was facing Liam, and Eugenie had a much lighter face than BB's, which was tanned and taut. She played with her yellow hair down, framing her face and hanging below her chest.

On Lysander's other side, Grady was whistling and saying, "What a trip, man! Is she even real?" but whatever he saw, Lysander didn't. Sure, Beatrice likely had a bit of Veela in her, but she was trying bloody hard to show it. And, of course, Lysander had always preferred gingers.

A stream of red flew upward in the air, and Loudspeak yelled, "Ah, yes, I think that's it! Er, let the match begin!"

Lysander pushed off the ground and followed Harper, who was the first to grab the Quaffle. She quickly made a reverse pass to Grady and then took her spot in the wings, just far enough so that Grady and the Harpies Chasers were still visible, and Lysander stayed within a meter of her at all times.

Grady was out-flying two Chasers clad in green and gold, Harper trailing him on the way to the goal hoops. The other side of the pitch was clouded in white, small flurries spinning from the unknown occasionally, Bludgers bouncing in and out. As predicted, Lysander couldn't see Henry or Liam, and as he spun his head around he realized that he also couldn't see either of the Bowen twins.

"Hey, any sign of the bimbos?" Lysander yelled at Harper as Grady attempted to score.

The Holyhead Keeper bounced the Quaffle away from the hoops and into the arms of an awaiting Chaser, so Harper didn't have time to respond before she was turning around and flying after the opponent. It was then that she steered straight into BB's outstretched bat.

"Harper, DUCK!" Lysander screamed, accelerating instinctively and hitting an incoming Bludger at BB's arm. It struck just in time for her bat to go limp and barely graze Harper's stomach. Harper flew onward without a second's hesitation and Lysander followed, spitting a wad of frozen saliva at BB's goggles on the way.

"The Beaters are taking hits today, people!" announced Loudspeak. "Bowen twins attempt to strike again but are well defended by the Bear and Looney Boy, or so I'm told. I can't bloody see a _thing_, can I? Dunno' how those Seekers are going to see a tiny ball in all this, either, and – oh, oh! I think the Quaffle's just got in! Yes, yes it has! The Holyhead Harpies score the first goal of the game! That's ten to none for now, folks, but I've no idea which Chaser sent it in."

The Quaffle disappeared mid-rebound, so it must have gone to the other side. Harper retreated and waited with Lysander for a ball to reveal itself. Erick was hovering just above them, scouting for the Snitch with his laser eyes. "How are those trainers doing for you?" Lysander asked Erick from below, rubbing his hands together for warmth.

"Don't know," said Erick, not breaking focus. "Can't feel ze toes. Must keep moving, ya?"

"Yeah," Lysander agreed, Erick separating from them just as Harper started laughing.

"Nancy boys, the lot of you," she said.

Lysander tried to still his chattering teeth but couldn't. As the Bowen Beaters came flying in from the mist he began to prepare himself for their wrath, knowing already that this was going to a be a long match.

* * *

After a long day of Quidditch practice, Lily wanted to do nothing more than sleep for a good twenty hours, but she made herself pack up supplies for Fred (in hopes that it may give the Gryffindor sub-captain reason to forgive her) and skip supper. Kenna had wanted to eat and drink with her tonight, but Lily had one chance to practice for an upcoming Astronomy practical that she desperately needed to pass, so she bailed on Kenna and made her way to their favorite spot alone.

The Astronomy Tower had been closed off due to the inclement weather, but Lily blasted open the doors to the staircase without batting an eyelash. When she made it to the top, she wasn't surprised to see a fellow ginger with a proclivity for trouble had done the same. Hugo's red hair was sticking up like icicles atop a puffy blue jacket, his eyes using all their strength to stay open behind the lens of a telescope pointed at the darkening sky.

Lily was out of breath from the climb and when Hugo heard her panting, he turned around and scowled, making Lily think he was going to storm off on her. "Relax!" she said in surrender, "I'm here to study, just like you."

Tonight was perhaps the worst night to stargaze, with the wintry mix making it impossible to see anything through the clouds, and the cold so sharp the glass in the telescopes was close to cracking. This was exactly why Hugo had chosen tonight to stargaze; he, like Lily, preferred a challenge.

Hugo harrumphed and turned back to his scope. Lily approached the adjacent scope and took a folded star map out of her pocket. The sweat on her forehead was slowly freezing and she decided she hated the feeling of the in-between – in between hot and cold, in between day and night, in between friends and enemies. She was craving a drink, but not the fiery kind that burned down her throat and flamed through her stomach. She wanted the cool kind, the coarse hail of peppermint vodka that would sear through her skin like a virus. Her flask, however, was already empty for the week. The only vice she had were the three pills Kenna had given her last Monday, the ones she'd been trying not to pop.

"Tracing the Scorpius constellation for your new book cover?" Lily asked Hugo, a pathetic attempt at small talk.

Hugo ignored her. She threw all three pills into her mouth and swallowed them dry.

The effects weren't immediate, so Lily had to fight off the sweatiness and jitters, including a couple of concerned looks from Hugo who didn't understand how she could be so heated in this cold. She'd managed to find some of the brighter constellations – Ursa Major, the bear, and Leo, the lion – even amidst the blizzard, but the practical was going to require finding constellations, and even specific stars, that were much harder to recognize.

It was when Lily was searching for Camelopardalis that her vision started to blur. The grouping of stars was faint to begin with, but as Lily looked through her scope she felt her pupils expanding and contracting like the pulse of a wave. Beside her, Hugo was talking to his Quick Quotes Quill, scribbling notes about the volcanoes on Venus.

"The Maat Mons, a massive shield volcano, is the second-highest mountain on the planet Venus," said Hugo. "It's eight kilometers."

Lily laughed, though she wasn't sure why. "Pfft, eight kilometers?! That's nothing!"

Hugo raised his eyebrows at her but then returned to his work. Lily tried to do the same, but all she truly wanted to do was turn her focus dial around and around and watch the sky move in and out like a kaleidoscope. She asked Hugo in between giggles, "Hey! Whereis the giraffe? The one nexto Dracoooo?"

Hugo finally met her eyes, but as Lily looked back at him all she saw were two large blue orbs that seemed to radiate in the snow. "Are you asking for my help?" he said.

"No!" Lily said as if he was an idiot. "I dunneed _help._"

Hugo had stepped away from his telescope and now had a hand on Lily's arm to steady her as she swayed in the wind, but she was swatting him away. "Yes, you do, Lil. I've seen your grades, okay? I know you need the help."

"Well!" said Lily, taking off her jacket in hopes that her arms might stop smoking. She felt relieved when it was off, free and strong, like she could take on the world. "But I dun deserve it, then."

"That's probably true," he said, his hands back on her elbows. Lily was staring at Hugo's freckles, which looked like embers in the moonlight. She felt a strange urge to bite at them when Hugo added in a gentle, cooing voice, "But it doesn't mean you can't ask. You know, please and thank you go a long way when asking for help."

Lily's eyes narrowed and the motion seemed to startle Hugo, who dropped her suddenly and shuffled backward, stammering, "Lily, why did your eyes just-" He stopped himself and looked back at the sky, where two clouds were beginning to separate and reveal a bright light that was almost perfectly round.

"Do I smell _bacon?"_ asked Lily from the floor, licking her lips that were beginning to grow fur.

"Lily, what are you doing here?" Hugo asked, scrambling to his feet. "Look up, Lil! It's a full moon! You have to get to the forest!"

The bones in Lily's hands were the first to start cracking, and she screamed in pain, thrashing her now furry arms at Hugo as he pulled her up and dragged her to the tower fence. "No!" she yelled, pushing him away, "No! I dunwant tooo, I dunwant to be a wolf anymooore."

"Oh, I really hope that's the wolfsbane talking and not some other substance," Hugo mumbled as Lily leaned over the railing. "Here's what you're going to do, okay? I'm going to push you off the tower and slow your fall. You'll be mid-transformation when you land, but if you're still conscious, follow the scent of something into the woods."

"Scent ofwhat?" asked Lily, her eyes still changing into a yellowish color as she blinked. "Bacon?"

"No!" Hugo was adamant, "_Not_ food. Go after something far away, go-go after the sea. Yeah, follow the scent of the ocean."

Lily tried to nod but instead her neck just stretched and arched forward unnaturally, and as Hugo was pushing her up and over the railing, she said to him in a mumble, "I fergot. Sosorry."

Then she was caught in between – in between land and sky, in between girl and wolf, in between delirious and dangerous.

* * *

Loudspeak was snoring into his magical megaphone. The sounds rumbled through the snow and across the pitch, where only the two teams and a few very dedicated fans remained. The match had been going on for nearly fifteen hours; it was well past midnight by now.

Somebody in the commentator stand must have shoved Loudspeak to wake him up, because he said with a start, "Did somebody score? No? Right, then it's still two hundred fifty to two hundred thirty for the Magpies. Goodnight."

The Magpies and Harpies had been neck and neck all day, the Magpies taking the lead when it started getting dark and the Harpies Keeper had struggled to stay positioned on her broom, let alone block oncoming Quaffles. The only player who did seem to have an ounce of energy left was Grady, who'd shot most of the goals for the Magpies and who made googly eyes at the Bowen twins whenever they passed.

Lysander couldn't see much of Grady through the darkness, but he could make out the screaming Bludgers perfectly well, and they usually signalled that Beatrice was close by. BB had stopped going for Harper after realizing that Lysander was far too good at protecting his teammate, but she did seem to enjoy hitting Bludgers at Erick every chance she got.

She was trying to tire him out, but she'd also successfully separated him from the Snitch every time he'd spotted it. It turned out that Erick really did have laser eyes, and had gone after the Snitch more times during the match than Lysander could count, but every time he came close to catching it BB and her sister would steer the Bludgers toward him and the Snitch would vanish into a cloud.

Now, a frustrated Erick was hovering below Lysander and Harper, who were huddled together to keep warm until the Quaffle came soaring toward them. Harper groaned at the thought of moving, and Lysander shoved her forward playfully so that the Quaffle landed in her open hands. She flew for Pierre's hoops to make a counter play, inching toward the center of the pitch where the awaiting Grady was sandwiched between the Beater twins.

A few meters away from Genie, Lysander could see the outlines of Liam and Henry, flying just as close together as he and Harper were. The duo was headed straight for Grady and his girls, masterfully avoiding the opponent Chasers along the way, and as Grady looked back and forth between Genie and BB, Harper threw him the Quaffle and he let it fly past him and into the arms of a Harpies Chaser.

The twins retreated, only to return to a still dazed Grady with a pair of Bludgers bouncing between them. Harper was catching up with Grady now, Lysander right behind her, and when the twins sent both Bludgers flying for opposite ends of Grady's broom, he jumped into the air to avoid the balls. Instead, the Bludgers collided and exploded into a bomb of black, and Harper had been the only one close enough to be hit by the impact.

"By golly, it looks like the Lazer has spotted the Snitch far outside the border!" announced Loudspeak as a sharp piece of shrapnel banged into Harper's shoulder, no doubt dislocating it. "He's coming in now, and let's all hope this'll be the end of it."

Harper spun backward and into Lysander, who steadied her and pulled her onto his broom, letting her own Phoenixbolt fall into the snow. "You okay?" he said as her shaking hand clutched the bone. Lysander wanted to tell her not to touch it, that it would only enhance the pain, but upon second glance he saw that Harper was in fact trying to set it back in its socket.

Everything around them – Grady, the twins, the dust of the Bludgers – had disappeared, and even Loudspeak hadn't seen Harper's injury. He was too hopeful that the match might be coming to an end, and so was Lysander as he listened to the commentator roar, "YES! Yes, the Lazer has the Snitch! That's it, everyone! Go home and go to sleep, because the Montrose Magpies have won the home match with a total of four hundred points!"

There was very little cheering as the game ended, all replaced with sighs of relief from both the fans and the players, most of whom descended to the ground as quickly as possible. The only exceptions to this unusual pattern were Harper, Lysander, and Liam. Lysander had been too busy tearing Harper's hand away from her shoulder to notice that Liam too had stilled atop his broom, and was staring them down from closer than he appeared. Lysander had a sinking suspicion that he'd been wrong, and that somebody had witnessed the injury after all.

A minute passed, and then Liam was flying beside Lysander with Harper's bad arm wrapped around his steady shoulder. She had fought Lysander for control ever since she'd gotten hit, but she did not protest when Liam steered her to the ground and walked her into the locker room.

Pierre had lit the room with jars full of bluebell flames, which he, Henry, and Erick were standing around to warm up. They were all too cold and too exhausted to celebrate, but of course Grady was jumping and screaming for joy. Lysander could hear him yelling, "Yeah, Germ! That's how we _do _it!" while he held the door open for Liam and Harper.

Lysander followed them inside but didn't join Grady's one-man celebration, instead waiting for Liam to chastise him after he failed to protect Harper. He was shocked when Liam did no such thing, instead depositing Harper back into Lysander's arms and pinning Grady to the nearest wall.

"_What_ were you thinking, thirteen?" Liam screamed at him, Grady cowering between his arms and wriggling to break free. "Were you _really_ so distracted by a couple of pretty girls that you led your own teammate into a _bomb?"_

Around them, the other Magpies were all rising to their feet. Only a confused Erick remained seated as both Henry and Pierre rushed to the defense of their respective best mates and Harper pushed Lysander off her so that she could attempt to pull Liam off of Grady.

"Stop it!" she yelled, prying Liam's hands from around Grady's head with her good arm. "This isn't his fault!"

"Yes, it is," seethed Liam, his eyes bulging at Grady even though Grady's eyes had glued shut from fear.

Harper groaned, unable to move Liam's hand, which was purple from numbness in the firelight. "Thirteen," Liam said, ignoring Harper, "You better listen because I'm only going to say this once: either you play as part of this team or you _don't_. Do you want to go home to America?"

Grady opened his eyes just enough to reveal a bit of their muddy brown color, and he shook his head as Liam banged a fist against the wall. Beside them, Harper said through gritted teeth, "You aren't going to drop him, Liam. If you wanted us to play together, maybe you shouldn't have made him take shots at his own teammate during practice!"

This time, Liam seemed to hear her. He faced the ground as he said to Grady, "Leave. I'll deal with you tomorrow." Then, once the door to the street had shut behind Grady and Pierre, Liam turned to face Harper for the first time Lysander had ever seen and looked directly into her blue eyes to say, "Are. You. Okay?"

She took a deep breath that hitched in the middle and said, "I will be as soon as you set my shoulder."

Lysander was mesmerized as he watched Liam put one hand on Harper's upper back and one around her wrist, never once breaking eye contact. It was only when he pulled her wrist upward in one smooth motion that Liam looked away, and when he looked back at her again to see her face contorted in pain, the expression he made was almost tender.

His hand still on her wrist, Liam stepped toward her and said quietly, "Harps, I-"

"_Don't_," she said, flicking his hand away. "_Don't _call me that." Then she turned around and walked out the door that led to the pitch.

Liam swerved around Lysander as if to go after her, but Henry stopped him, pulling him away from the door and saying, "Come on, Hardcap. Our girls are waiting for us."

Liam wiped his eyes and walked out with Henry just as Erick met Lysander's gaze from the comfortable bench. The two silently decided who would have to go back into the cold. It was Lysander who eventually nodded and followed in Harper's wake, shielding his nose from the cold with his two shirts as he ran through the stands and found her at the top of the commentator's box.

The sun was beginning to reveal itself over the North Sea, whose waters had to rise above a layer of fresh ice just to lap atop the shore. Lysander could see the whole beach from here, the clouds finally clearing from the town, and he was watching the light of the Scurdie Ness circle round and round when he heard Harper sniffle from beside him.

She was staring up at the sky, holding back tears and shivering slightly as strands of white hair blew out of their loosened braids only to get caught in her long lashes. Seeing her like this reminded Lysander of the night he'd first heard her sing, and he decided that Harper was either tough as nails or easily bruised, loudly assertive or fetally curled, beautiful or depressing.

"I'm fine," she said, but he put an arm around her anyway. "It's just hard sometimes. All you Nancy boys make it bloody hard."

Lysander laughed, a numbing, aching feeling in his cheeks as they bunched together. When it sounded as though Harper had caught her breath, he said, "You were together, weren't you? You and the Bear?"

Harper nodded against his shoulder but didn't elaborate.

"What happened?" asked Lysander. Once he figured she wasn't going to answer and that he'd have to make a guess, he remembered what Henry had said to make Liam leave and asked, "Another girl?"

"Something like that," said Harper. "You know, I try to convince myself, everyday, that he doesn't have me anymore. But the truth is that he does, just not in the way he used to."

Lysander looked back at the lighthouse, which appeared to float in the water during the high tide. He watched that water rise and fall and he thought about the flakes that peeled off his skin in the night, like layers of himself shedding away with the winter. And then he thought about the true layers inside him, the ones that usually seemed too heavy to peel away, but that grew lighter every time he felt less alone.

"There will be someone after him," he told Harper.

"Let me guess," she said, "when I least expect him?"

"No. When you're most in need of him."

Harper pulled Lysander in for a hug and her eyes peered out over his shoulder so that she was now the one looking at the harbor and the beach. When she stilled suddenly, Lysander pulled out of the embrace and followed Harper's gaze to a reddish-brown spot bobbing in the ice water.

"What is that?" asked Harper, but Lysander had already started running.

He heard Harper's footsteps in his wake, but he didn't look back, leaping down the stadium three steps at a time until he jumped onto the pitch and plowed through the snow. He dragged pounds of powder into the locker room and ran out the other side, making a sharp turn on the road toward the beach and then sprinting onto the sand. He let his knees sink when he was close enough to watch the weeping werewolf become the more familiar Lily, and his hands were on her ginger hair when she started to cough up a mixture of vomit and blood, spewing between wretches, "Please. Help me."

"Harper, send a Patronus to St. Mungo's!" yelled Lysander as Harper caught up with him, turning Lily on her side with one hand and fumbling with his wand in the other. He couldn't think of any spells that would fix this, and he didn't know how to begin to explain this to Harper, but amidst this confusion Lysander remembered seeing someone at the hospital who could both fix things and keep a secret.

"Wait, stop!" said Lysander as Harper began the incantation. "More specific than St. Mungo's. Send it to Ilana Higgs. Her Patronus is a-an okapi – a zebra-giraffe hybrid thing."

"_Expecto Patronum," _said Harper with an understanding nod. A polar bear stomped from her wand and ran inland, and Lysander recognized more of Harper in that bear than just the ability to thrive in harsh climates.

"Let me see her," said Harper once the spell had gone. Lysander looked up at her questionably, but made room on Lily's other side.

Lily was unconscious now and her head was resting on Lysander's lap. She didn't have as many scars on her face as he was used to seeing, but there were some puncture wounds around her chest and her whole body was hotter than fire. Harper placed a hand on Lily's forehead before lifting her eyelid and inspecting her dilated pupils that gave her no response, no sign of life.

"She's on something," Harper said, "something strong."

Lysander sighed, not knowing what to do. A few minutes had passed since the polar bear had run off, and he found himself thinking aloud, "We should have heard from her by now."

Harper looked around as if expecting an okapi to come trotting from the trees, but instead both she and Lysander were taken aback by a hawk that circled them from above and whispered enchantingly, _Take her to the back entrance._

Figuring he didn't have time to question the shape of the Patronus, Lysander shoved his wand in his pocket and held Lily's head with both hands.

"Are you strong enough to do this in one shot?" asked Harper, sensing his idea. "Is _she?"_

Lysander answered with a turn on the spot and soon Harper was gone and he and Lily were Apparating to London in a single jump. They landed on a slick sidewalk outside the magical hospital disguised as an abandoned warehouse building. Lysander looked down at Lily and made sure she was still breathing before lifting her into his arms and walking around to the back of the giant square.

Ilana was shivering behind her green robes by a small door on the exact opposite end of the main entrance. The mysterious Slytherin girl Lysander remembered from Potions classes looked much older than she had at Hogwarts. Her thick black hair was pinned to the back of her head with unruly ringlets dancing around her neck, and her eyes were bloodshot red around grassy green, much like Lysander suspected his own must look after the night he'd had.

"Here, bring her inside," Ilana said, wisely choosing to skip a proper greeting. She opened the door and Lysander walked into a hallway that was far darker and narrower than the one he'd walked through on Christmas Eve.

"This way," said Ilana, pointing to the left and leading the way to a sterile white room with no windows and one cot. Lysander laid Lily on the bed while Ilana rummaged through a moving cupboard, asking as she sorted, "How did you know I was here?"

"I saw you in the werewolf ward over the holiday," said Lysander, peeking over Ilana's shoulder to catch a glimpse of the medical instruments on the table. He regretted that decision as soon as he saw the knives of various lengths and sharpness laid in a row as if being displayed. "You're a Healer now."

"Not exactly," said Ilana, turning around and pushing her hands on Lily's stomach until Lily curled up and groaned in her sleep.

Lysander flinched.

"I'm studying at a Muggle University here in London, but yes, I'm also a Healer trainee. Lysander, do you know if Lily's been abusing alcohol at all recently? Lysander?"

He was looking at Ilana and trying to decide if he could trust her. When he realized he had no other choice, he said, "Yes, she's been known to."

Ilana gulped, but her voice was calm as she announced, "I'm going to have to pump her stomach. You'll want to wait in the hallway."

"Is she going to be okay?"

"Yes. She's going to be okay."

* * *

The smell of the ocean had been replaced with the smell of alcohol, though not the good kind. This was more like rubbing alcohol, too pure and too clean, and Lily crinkled her nose against the scratchy pillow as if that might rid of the stench. She tried to open her eyes, but her lashes were stuck together like congealed beans. Breathing proved difficult as well, since her mid-section felt as though it had been cracked open like splitting wood.

"She should wake up soon," a female voice Lily recognized but couldn't name said from within the same room. "When she's ready, you can take her out the way you came."

"Take her where, exactly?" This voice was deeper, a male's, and it was more familiar than the girl's. Lily had heard it recently, though not at school. She'd heard it somewhere more private, intimate, secret. It was Lysander.

"I won't tell Harry if you won't," said the girl. "I know how the media talks about his family, and this should be kept quiet, at least for a while."

Lily was concentrated on listening to Lysander's breathing, which was anything but even as he asked, "What about Al?"

"Why are you asking me about Potter?" When the girl said the name of Lily's brother, Lily remembered who she was. It was Ilana; it had to be. Al had always called her by her surname, too.

"I was there when you first produced your Patronus in fifth year," said Lysander. "It's changed."

"Yeah, well, life's changed, hasn't it?" said Ilana. "Anyway, Potter and I aren't speaking much these days, so no, I won't be telling him either. But Lysander, you have to tell _someone_. This is serious, and it's probably going to get worse before it gets better."

"I know," Lysander said, and from the persistence in his voice Lily suspected anyone would have believed him. "But I can do this. I can help her. I can-"

"Fix her?" said Ilana. "I thought that about someone once. But you can't fix somebody who doesn't want to be fixed."

"She does want to. We both do."

Lily tried to nod, tried to agree, but the strength it took to move her neck exhausted her, and soon she wasn't drifting into sleep so much as slamming into it.

* * *

Wet, clammy hands were squeezing his. Startled, Lysander sat straight up and opened his eyes. Lily was staring up at him, awake.

Lysander sighed and he felt like a blast of wind was rushing from his lungs. Releasing Lily's hands, he banged his fists on the frame of her cot and half-stood from his chair beside her, clenching his jaw and asking, "Why'd you do this, Lil? Why do you _keep _doing this?"

She blinked at him and he cursed her for hiding her beautiful brown eyes from him, even for a second. He was standing now, pacing across the room like he had paced on this same tile floor the night before Christmas, only this time his anger was inconsolable. This time his anger was personal.

"People shouldn't rely on me, okay?" he yelled, wishing the room had a window he could break. "Because even if I can protect everybody for a second, I can't do it forever, and one of these days I'm not going to be there. I'm not going to play defense and I'm not going to stumble upon lucky shoes and I'm not going to find you! The next time this happens, Lily, I might not _find _you."

He paused at the end of the cot, his hands gripping the bed sheet that Lily had kicked off her bare legs in sleep. She didn't look as small in this bed as she should have. She didn't look young or scared or broken; she looked wise and steady and strong.

"Thank you," she said, and with two words, his life changed.

His life changed because after everything his soldier self had done – sending his own father to Azkaban, letting Rose go to a better guy, letting Lorcan _be_ the better guy, saving Lily from her suicide swim, holding Lily when his best mate had died, finding Lily when she needed him – was finally being acknowledged by the only person who seemed to matter, the only person who could possibly understand.

And so it didn't matter that she was only sixteen and he was nearly twenty. It didn't matter that she was his best mate's little sister. It didn't matter that he'd spent whole days of his childhood in Godric's Hollow making fun of the way she dressed like a boy. It didn't matter that, for years, he hadn't seen her. He saw her now.

Within seconds, Lysander was back at Lily's side and, without much forethought, Lysander was kissing Lily. He pulled away before it even stopped, shaking his head and shutting his eyes, but then Lily's hands were on his face and she was pulling him back to her. He was crying and she was kissing his tears and suddenly the winter didn't seem so dry.

* * *

_**Note: **What did you think? Please let me know in a review; I'd especially like to know your thoughts on Harper/Liam and, of course, the Lily/Lysander kiss that has been a long time coming. The next chapter will be tons of fun and much happier than usual, but it'll take longer than a week for me because I have to work this weekend. Check my profile for more info. Thanks for reading!_

_-Hailey_


	5. Aquarius

_**Note:** Sorry for those long two weeks, guys. Work has been keeping me busy, and this chapter proved to be a lot harder to write than I'd expected. I'm experimenting a bit with humor and quick, snappy dialogue in this story (and this chapter in particular), but it makes pacing really hard. Anyway, if you have any idea what I mean, let me know in a review, because I'd love to hear your comments/advice on this. Of course, I also really hope you enjoy the chapter._

_-Hailey_

* * *

**5 – Aquarius **

Images that had once been dreams but were now memories flooded her mind as the water rushed into her ears, beating and pulsing against her brain the way her heart had been thumping against her chest without reprieve for the past two weeks. Her ribs were a cage that could no longer contain its prisoner, and the water was her escape route. It flowed through every part of her, every single cell, even the monstrous ones, _especially_ the monstrous ones. And she let it. She let the water crush her and cleanse her and hurt her and heal her and flood her and feed her, over and over again.

"Oi!" came a muffled yell, bellied by the bubbles of the bath.

Lily rose to the surface, her hair freed first and hugging her slowly revealed face. She sighed to open her eyes, to let the water pour out of her ears, to let her reverie fade away. Reality was so much worse this way – so much sharper and dirtier and messier. Her naked body scraped against the marble tub and she shivered from the slick sound it made, but she told herself to listen to the waterfalls roaring from the myriad fountains still spewing busily from the bath's center. The fountains reminded her of that night more than the toilet stalls that hung loosely open at the other end of the room or the stained glass mermaid window that Roxanne was always fascinated by. The fountains reminded her of crying, and for once in what felt like an eternity, Lily wasn't ashamed by the thought of tears.

A splash of foam hit the back of her head. Lily turned to face Kenna, who was also naked and unashamed as she spun in ballerina circles through the water, her breasts bouncing among the bubbles. "You were under for nearly five minutes! Didn't you worry I was lonely up here on my own?"

"Five minutes, really?" asked Lily, sitting on the tub's bench toward its edge and hunching her shoulders so that she didn't expose herself the way Kenna did.

Kenna laughed and her dark ringlets threatened to permeate the water's border, but she avoided such a catastrophe by standing up even straighter and teasing, "With lungs like that, it looks like you'll be a proper kisser one day."

Lily turned away to hide her suddenly flushed cheeks, but she was terrible at hiding anything from Kenna. The only reason Lily hadn't yet told Kenna about the events of last full moon was her busy schedule; Quidditch practice had been rather intense now that the Hufflepuff match was fast approaching, and Lily had actually taken Professor Longbottom's advice and was studying every night, often with Hugo's help. Ironically, it was this same immersion in schoolwork that had kept Lily from thinking back on the full moon itself. It wasn't until she'd gone underwater just now that she'd truly relived that night, and it wasn't until Kenna had asked Lily to show her the infamous Prefects' Bathroom that the two had had a moment alone to gossip.

"What was that for?" Kenna asked, swimming around to face Lily. She sat across from Lily on the same bench, her posture perfect as usual even with her excited curiosity. "Spill now, please. What are you blushing about?"

Lily ran a hand through her wet hair, her fingers catching in the red net, as Kenna broke posture to lean forward and grab Lily's arm. "Did something happen last month? That Sunday you missed afternoon practice?"

Lily nodded. "I wanted to tell you as soon as I got back to Hogwarts, but you were still on the pitch, and then when you finally came to the common room, you and Fred actually seemed quite chummy, so I didn't want to mess things up again."

"Yes, well he was still mad at you then, so I was reminding him of all the great things you'd done on his account, like get him together with Lila," Kenna rambled before shaking her head and remembering the topic of their conversation. "Anyway, that's not the point! What happened to you?"

"I had a bit of a bad transformation Saturday night," said Lily.

"Right. Hugo filled me in."

"Yeah, so I ended up in Montrose, because I must have followed my brother's scent again, and then Lysander-"

"Wait. Lysander Scamander?" Kenna interrupted. "The one who was James's best mate? The Beater?"

Lily nodded again, this time with a smile to match. "He still lives in Montrose and plays for the Magpies. He found me unconscious somewhere and took me to St. Mungo's where I had to get my stomach pumped. When I woke up, I thanked him for helping me, and he-" Lily paused, unable to form her next words. She wasn't afraid to say them and therefore trying to mask her fear, though; she was ecstatic and was simply trying to contain it.

Eventually, the words bubbled out of her, popping along her tongue. "He kissed me."

Kenna jumped and splashed and screamed, and probably would have hugged her if Lily hadn't shielded herself with the water. Still, Kenna's enthusiasm couldn't help but be contagious, and soon Lily too felt like screaming.

"Tell me everything!" Kenna squealed, and Lily obliged. She told Kenna about the pills she'd swallowed (the ones _Kenna_ had supplied her) before transforming, about Hugo slowing her fall from the Astronomy Tower, about half-waking in the hospital and overhearing Lysander's conversation with Ilana Higgs, and finally, about the kiss. The only part she left out were the exact words Lysander had told her when she'd thanked him. She left out his vulnerability, his brokenness, his cracks, choosing instead to keep all that to herself.

Overwhelmed by the story, Kenna gaped at Lily once she words reached a lull and asked, still wide-eyed, "So, what does this mean? Are you two together now?"

"Together?" said Lily, as if she was unsure of the word's meaning. In a way, she was. She'd been surrounded by "together people" her whole life – her parents, her grandparents, her aunt and uncle, Teddy and Victoire, Rose and Scorpius, Hugo and Nigel – but she'd never once considered herself one of them. She'd tried to imagine it loads of times, tried to imagine being a "together person" with Scorpius, but that was precisely the problem: with him, she could only ever be a together _person_, but what she'd wanted, what she'd wished for, was to one day be a together _people_.

She wondered now if Lysander felt the same, or had possibly wished to _be_ the same. He too had never been in a committed relationship, as far as Lily knew, but she had no way of deciphering what exactly her relationship with him was, if it was any relationship at all. So, after thinking it through, she answered Kenna, "To be honest, I don't know. We're not _together_. We're something, though. I think."

"You didn't talk about it?" Kenna asked. "Surely you at least decided when you'd next see each other."

"Actually, I think we both sort of assumed I'd show up on the next full moon," Lily said with a laugh. It wasn't very funny to her now, especially considering how long the last two weeks had felt to her and how much longer another fortnight would feel, but it was true. She and Lysander had lingered in their secret room at St. Mungo's for quite some time before they'd left, but when they did, he led her in an Apparition to Hogsmeade and they parted with one last embrace.

Kenna blew tiny holes into the bubbles, her forehead crinkling like dampened paper from thought. "D'you really want to wait that long?" she said, pointing her wand at the holes she'd made and making the water jump from the surface and shoot through the holes before raining down once more.

"I don't think I have much of a choice," said Lily, suddenly sad. Truthfully, she wanted nothing more than to see Lysander again, and the prospect of seeing him in her human form, with her hair washed and her make-up on, was almost too sweet to deny.

Setting her wand on the tub's edge, Kenna scooted toward Lily and said, "But you do have a choice, because tomorrow's Saturday, and because I'm _from_ Montrose, and because I think it's about time I take home my new best friend."

There were so many reasons not to go. There was the Ravenclaw vs. Slytherin Quidditch match tomorrow that would be crucial to watch if Gryffindor hoped to beat Ravenclaw later in the year. There was Quidditch practice Sunday afternoon. There was the sixth years' first Potions exam since the mid-term Monday morning. None of that stopped Lily from saying, "Let's go pack."

* * *

The most peaceful part of Lysander's day took place in the shower. For ten minutes, he could just be alone, away from his rowdy roommates and the biting cold, consumed by a different rowdiness, a different bite. He showered in sizzling water that spat at him in a machine gun of bullets, and every red mark that water left on his pale skin reminded him that he was alive. They reminded him of crying, and of all the tears he had finally shed after holding them in for an eternity.

Lysander inhaled deeply and looked down at the spots on his chest that appeared and disappeared as quickly as ripples on a river. The red they left in flashes wasn't like paint or sunburns, lathered ephemerally atop his skin; this red was always within him and the hot water simply revealed it. It made him think of Lily, because for the whole two weeks that had passed since he'd been with her, he couldn't shake the feeling that her kiss was still searing beneath his skin. The warmth he'd felt with her had always been in him and Lily had simply revealed it.

Reaching blindly through the shower curtain for the bar of soap that sat on the sink, Lysander jumped and nearly slipped when the bar was deposited in his open palm. He dropped the bar on the floor and grabbed it after catching himself, standing upright once more and sighing. "Harper?" he asked, irritated but not surprised.

"Yes?" Harper's voice called from the other side of the curtain, far too close for Lysander's comfort.

"Does it not strike you as at all inappropriate for us to be using the washroom at the same time, me naked?" asked Lysander, scrubbing his body with the soap.

"Oh, please, I'm just having a wee," said Harper. "And anyway, as much as you'd like to believe otherwise, you've got nothing I haven't seen before."

Telling himself that Harper was understandably used to this sort of thing after spending years with a team of all male Quidditch players, Lysander accepted her presence, stretched his hand past the curtain again, and said, "Fine. Can you make yourself useful and put this back, then?"

"Goodness, no," she said, flushing the toilet. "I'm not using that for my hands now that I know where it's been."

Lysander chuckled as Harper added, "Nice chops, by the way."

"What?" Lysander said. "I wasn't singing." The shower was his quiet time; he'd never ruin it with his lousy voice.

"I know. I was talking about last night."

Lysander nearly fell again, this time hanging on to the curtain and pulling himself up before it went down with him.

Harper was cackling from a few feet away. "That was quite the solo show. You know, I'd suggest we start a band together, but I'd hate to be overshadowed by your _incredible_ talent."

Now, the red spots were spreading to Lysander's face, even though he towered above the showerhead. "All right, all right," he croaked out. "Are you done now?"

"With the toilet? Yes," said Harper. "With pestering you? Never."

"Brilliant," Lysander cursed her.

Harper ignored him. "I knew there was something up between you and the werewolf after those two nights, but I didn't realize just how whipped you were until I heard you belting out those ballads. She sure has gotten your wand in a knot, hasn't she?"

Lysander quickly shampooed his hair and then turned the water off, having had enough. He let the steam envelop him and wrapped the towel he'd hung on the curtain rod around his waist. Opening the curtain, he saw Harper sitting fully clothed on the toilet seat, flipping through the latest _Quibbler_ with a knowing expression on her face.

"My wand is perfectly straight, thank you very much," said Lysander, snatching the magazine from Harper's hand and throwing it back atop the stack that lived on the windowsill.

"Mmm," said Harper, trying not to laugh, "And yet it's still so _short_."

Lysander rolled his eyes, still not quite used to Harper's innuendoes even though he should have been by now. Facing the mirror so that he could magically shave off the scruff he'd been growing around his chin, he got back on topic and said, "Not that it's any of your business, but Lily and I are just testing the waters right now."

"Oh, so there _are_ waters to test, then?" asked Harper, standing up and meeting Lysander's gaze in the reflection of the mirror.

His charm having cut him dry, Lysander rinsed his face and said, "We may have connected that night, yes, but it was only mild snogging and I haven't seen her since." As he said the words, Lysander couldn't help but feel like he was lying. He'd said similar words to James once about Rose, afraid to admit that a single kiss had meant more to him than it was supposed to mean to a boy. Now he was a man, but he was still afraid – still afraid of the truth, of commitment, of feeling.

"You haven't seen her since?" asked Harper, sounding shocked.

Lysander shrugged in admittance. "She's back at school, and I'm here."

"So? Hogwarts isn't exactly long-distance, and might I remind you of the magical mode of transportation called Apparition? Have you at least asked her out?"

"What, like on a date?" asked Lysander. He was facing Harper outside the mirror now, his towelled behind leaning against the sink and his arms crossed against his dripping chest.

"Yes, like on a date," said Harper mid-chuckle. When Lysander furrowed his eyebrows as if considering this, it was her turn to roll her eyes. She walked out of the loo after patting his chest and saying, "Good luck, mate."

Lysander stayed behind, frozen in more ways than one. When he could move again, he turned around to face the mirror once more, clearing its steam with his hand just enough so that his green eyes were visible through the mist. Their color was not anything astonishing – dark like a forest the whole way round, with just the tiniest rays of yellow spreading from the pupil – but it was different. It was different from the color of Lorcan's eyes, which had been lighter and brighter. It was quiet yet deep like a crater lake surrounded by coniferous pines. It was peaceful.

* * *

Lily and Kenna flew to Montrose on frozen brooms at first light Saturday morning. By the time they began their descent toward the shores of the North Sea, both girls were near hypothermic and Lily was attempting to focus on her sense of smell. It was her only sense that still worked properly in the February air, enhanced by her werewolf alter-ego, and she almost recognized the town she'd only seen while half-awake by its scent. Salt wafted through and above the slushed ice on the beach, the same scent Hugo had instructed her to follow last month. Chimney smoke puffed out of houses and into the sky, the same muskiness she associated with winter nights curled up in Gryffindor Tower, a maroon wool blanket wrapped around her. Crisply cold air hid in her nose as if it too needed to keep warm.

She'd worn her Quidditch goggles to protect her eyes during the flight, but they'd grown too fogged to see through. Lily regretted missing out on a birds-eye view of the small town that was said to be surrounded by water: the North Sea to the east, River South Esk to the south and its basin to the west. Kenna had explained to Lily the night before that the river split the town into two sections. What was generally referred to as Montrose lay to the north of Bridge St., the village shops lining the basin and the Muggle Golf Links and Magpies stadium along the eastern beach. South of the river was Ferryden, but the Montrose harbor was lodged against an outcropping of land where the Scurdie Ness lighthouse protruded from the rocky shore. It was on the bridge itself that Lily and Kenna landed, Lily following a swift Kenna as the latter started running north and led the way to her family home, perched at the mouth of the basin whose waters practically ran through her garden, roaring beneath the bridge and releasing into the ocean.

"We nearly lost it to a hurricane a few years ago," said Kenna as the two looked up at the house from the front walk.

"No kidding," said Lily. The house was run-down in every possible way: dark rotting wood was ripping from the walls, bits of black shingles were falling from the roof, and the dirty glass windows were cracking in the cold. Its size, which was larger even than the Potter home in Godric's Hollow, seemed to be the only thing keeping it upright, but once Lily walked inside she realized that the space was not a blessing at all. It was a curse.

She could smell the emptiness from the entryway, which was stark and dimly lit in front of a large staircase and adjacent to a larger sitting room. At Lily's house, smells of ripening bananas, forever-in-use laundry detergent, and hints of brotherly body odour crept up her nose as soon as she entered. At Kenna's house, all Lily could smell was dust.

Framed pictures of various sizes that Lily assumed had once been hung were now leaning against the walls from spots on the creaky floor. Most were turned over so that Lily couldn't see their subjects or movements, but a few held photos and paintings of a beautifully bronzed brunette couple that could only have been Kenna's parents.

"Come on," said Kenna when she saw Lily staring. "The bar's this way."

Lily dropped her duffel bag by the door but kept her shoes on, following Kenna into a corner of the sitting room where a pantry as tall as the ceiling was stocked full of more kinds of liquor than Lily knew existed. Its black cupboards were the only ones in the whole house not covered with cobwebs.

Kenna shuffled through the vodka collection until she settled on a bottle, then grabbed an old lemon from the kitchen table and started squeezing into a shot glass. Lily stood awkwardly at the head of the table and asked, "Where's your sister?" It was late morning on a Saturday; surely she wasn't working at this hour.

"Dunno'," said Kenna, lifting the filled shot glass to her mouth, pouring it down her throat, and grimacing from the sourness before she pulled a sugar cube from her pocket and plopped it on her tongue. "Probably with that idiot boyfriend she keeps running back to."

After making another, Kenna floated the glass over to Lily, who caught and drank it before dousing it with two whole sugar cubes. "Not such a sour wolf after all, are you?" Kenna joked.

Lily was laughing when she heard the door open, followed by a few slow creaks of the floorboards. Leaning over to glance at the entryway, Lily spotted a long, lean woman stumbling toward them. She looked almost exactly like Kenna, only with longer and tanner legs, longer and straighter hair, longer and lighter eyes, longer and lovelier years behind her.

"Lemon Drop," said the woman when she stopped suddenly in the doorway of the sitting room. "What are you doing here?"

"Evey," Kenna smiled, though she did not approach her sister for an embrace. "I thought I'd come up for the weekend. This is my friend, Lily."

Lily discreetly hid the shot glass on a chair by the wall, not realizing that Kenna was in the middle of taking her second shot and Evey hadn't even attempted to stop her. Walking around the table, Lily extended her hand. Evey's shake was weak and weary, and her eyes were glazed over with the type of sadness that was too full of feeling to have come from substance abuse. Lily recognized that it, like the bruises on Evey's neck that others may have mistaken for hickeys, came from grief.

The two continued to look at each other after their hands dropped, until Evey broke eye contact and said to the room, "We should go out to lunch. Catch up."

"Definitely!" said Kenna, perky as could be even as she stood completely still. "Is the Indian Cottage open on Saturdays?"

"I think so," Evey nodded. "Just give me a minute to change and then we'll go." She turned around in a hurry and ran upstairs, leaving Lily to wonder if she'd been in those clothes since last night.

Evey returned wearing clean jeans beneath a thick wool coat and the three set off for town. It was a short walk to High St., and they didn't pass a single person on their way, most likely because of the cold. Lily was behind Kenna and Evey, not wanting to make chit-chat as she scanned the shops in search of Woolworths, above which Lysander's flat was located.

She didn't exactly know what she planned to do or say to Lysander now that she was in Montrose, but she was too close to turn back without at least seeing him. Would he want to see her? _Could_ he even see her, or would he be too busy with the Magpies? Would he think her visit was sweet or would she come off as a stalker? And what would she say when he asked her why she'd come – the truth, that she'd come for him? Lily sighed and glued her eyes to the frosted ground, telling herself that she would at least have all of lunch to come up with a plan.

But, as fate would have it, she did not have all of lunch to come up with a plan. The restaurant was a red hole in the wall across the street from the Montrose church, and Lily didn't even make it inside before she spotted Lysander through the windowed wall. He was sitting at the table nearest the door, his cheeks still flushed from cold and his hair statically frozen. German traded Seeker Lazer Ludwig was seated beside Lysander, mesmerized by the confusing menu below him. On Lysander's other side was a young woman with bleached blonde hair that was cut short and styled like a boy's, her pale skin sparkling even without light, her bright blue eyes piercing through the glass. Across from them were Magpies Keeper Pierre Tottingham and the American Chaser whose name Lily couldn't recall.

"Oh, bloody hell," Lily panicked when she saw them, instinctively backing away so that _they_ wouldn't see _her_.

Evey was already halfway through the open door, but Kenna heard Lily and turned around to ask what was going on. Lily gestured toward the window and Kenna followed her gaze before Lily pulled her back.

"Wait, is that-" asked Kenna.

"Yes," said Lily, her eyes shut as if that might make the party of people disappear.

"Well, this is brilliant!" said Kenna, rubbing Lily's arm. "We're here not five minutes and we bump straight into him! Let's go and say hello; maybe we can all sit together."

"Wait!" This time, Lily grabbed Kenna's arm. "Did you see the girl he's with? What if something's going on between them?"

Kenna rolled her eyes at Lily, but Lily pleaded. Giving in, Kenna peered through the window to gain a second look, then turned back to Lily and said, "That's Harper Frye, Lil! Don't you recognize her? She's a Magpies Chaser."

"I know," said Lily, though truthfully she hadn't registered this fact. "But there could still be something between them! I told you, we didn't talk about anything, so he could very well be dating somebody else and I'd have no idea."

"Which is exactly what we came here to find out," Kenna argued. "So stop being a pussy and start being a wolf!"

Lily whined through her chattering teeth and followed Kenna inside, where they found Evey already pulling up three chairs to Lysander's table.

"There you are," said Evey upon seeing Kenna and Lily. An arm around Kenna, she said to the table, "This is my little sister, Kenna, and her friend, Lily."

Lily didn't look at Lysander as Evey introduced the Magpies, starting with Harper. Each of them waved to Kenna and Lily, and Lily could have sworn that Harper even winked at her. It was only Erick who stood from his chair to shake Lily's hand, saying rather genuinely, "Lily Potter, eet is so good to officially meet you. I am roommate to Lysander."

"Wait, you're Lily _Potter?" _asked Grady, the American, from across the table. "Holy crap."

"Shut it, Sutter," Harper spat at him, and he immediately did as he was told, replacing his wide eyes with a forced smile.

Once he'd quieted, Evey turned to her final introduction and said, "And this is Lysander, though it seems like you two may already know each other."

The others had been scooting around a second table the waiter had brought over, and somehow Lily had ended up in the empty seat that was now directly across from Lysander, sandwiched between Grady and Pierre. Unable to avoid him any longer, she took her seat and said to Lysander, "Hi."

"Hi," he said, baffled by her presence. He kept his eyes on her even as he answered Evey, "Yeah, we've known each other since we were little kids, through James."

Lily looked away at that. She was disappointed, though she knew there was no reason to be. His explanation had been completely true, just not entirely honest. Lily tried to bury herself in her menu as Evey took a seat at one end of what was now two tables and made small talk with Pierre and Erick, Kenna on the other side glancing curiously between Lysander and her friend.

"What are you doing?" whispered Lysander without looking at Lily, his face also half hidden by a leather-bound menu.

"Perusing the lamb dishes," said Lily. "Which one's better, d'you reckon? The vindaloo or the saag?"

"So, do you guys go to that famous UK magic school?" asked Grady loudly, which Lily learned throughout the meal was just his normal voice. "What's it called again, Pigfarts or something?"

"Hogwarts," Kenna corrected him. "Yeah, Lily's in her sixth year and I'm in my fifth. Go, go, Gryffindor."

"That's right!" yelled Harper suddenly, catching Lily off guard. Of _course_ Harper was a Gryffindor alumna. She gave Kenna a high-five and the two started talking about Quidditch matches and Professor Longbottom, Grady fascinated by every word. As they waited to place their orders, neither Lysander nor Lily joined in on the conversation, too busy pretending not to look at each other every few seconds.

"Where did you go to school, Grady?" asked Kenna when the waiter finally arrived.

"The Salem Institute, near Boston."

Lily ordered lamb saag and garlic naan and Lysander copied her while Kenna exclaimed at Grady, "Wow, lots of history there, I'm sure!"

"Oh yeah," said Harper, "A few hundred years or so. Very impressive. Meanwhile, Hogwarts has been around for, what, a millennium?"

Grady smirked. "You know, for someone who pretends to care so little for her own Quidditch team, you sure do have a lot of school spirit, Harpsichord."

Kenna acted as referee as the other two continued to argue with each other for a while longer, allowing Lysander and Lily to converse without being seen or pestered. Lysander was the first to nudge Lily's foot under the table, which nearly made her spit out the water she'd just sipped. She knew that he was still waiting for her to answer his previous question, so she gave in and said quietly, "I came with Kenna."

Lysander's right arm was sitting on the table, stretching well past his place mat so that his hand was brushing Lily's knife. She was thinking about the way that hand had tenderly held hers as she'd woken in St. Mungo's, and how it had then gripped her hospital bed, filled with anger and anxiety. She thought about how she'd wished for that hand to be wrapped around hers again, and how her wish had come true.

It was this thought that made Lily lay down her left arm so that her own hand was inches from Lysander's as she added, "I came to see you."

She didn't know when he stretched his arm farther and painted her palm with his index finger, but when their food arrived she felt his hand disappear from hers once more. For the next twenty minutes, everyone at the table focused on their dishes and compared spice levels between each other. Grady struggled to keep his mild sauce down, gulping water even after Harper informed him that doing so would make things worse, and both Harper and Kenna seemed at ease with their medium-heat vegetarian meals. On the other side of the table, Pierre plowed through eight pieces of naan and then went on to eat Evey's leftovers, the bread soaking up the spice to make it more tolerable. Lily and Lysander had been the only ones to ask for extreme spice, and Lily chuckled every time Lysander covered up his coughs with the excuse that he had the hiccoughs.

They had all long finished eating by the time Pierre finally sat back in his seat and announced, "All right, then, I think I'm full."

"Yeah?" asked Grady, for once the only person not bursting with laughter. "You think you made up for that half-marathon from this morning?"

"Did you run that as a team?" asked Kenna, making Lily feel suddenly guilty for missing the Hogwarts match that was most likely ending right about now.

"Every morning," said Pierre.

"Liam still working you to the bone?" asked Evey, referring to the Magpies' captain, Liam Hardy.

"A little deeper than the bone, actually," said Grady, "you know, somewhere in the marrow area."

"European Cup eez approaching. Vee must be prepared," said Erick pragmatically. Beside him, Lysander nodded curtly in agreement, smirking at Lily as she blushed over the way a section of his hair fell in front of his eyes.

"Yes, well, some of us are being asked to prepare a little harder than others," said Grady. Lily didn't know what he was referring to, though his teammates seemed to. "Honestly, I'd much rather be celebrating our victory against the Harpies than beating myself to death to prepare for what could very well be my last game next month."

"It won't be your last game, Chummy," said Pierre, reaching his arm around Lily so that he could pat his mate on the back.

Grady patted Pierre in return but didn't look quite as cheery as he had at the beginning of the meal. It was when he looked over at Pierre and made eye contact with Evey that his eyes lit up once more and he said, "Speaking of celebration, I could seriously go for a drink right now. Mind opening up the bar, Miss Meyer?"

Next thing Lily knew, the group was leaving a pile of galleons on the table and heading farther into town. Grady's energy had rebounded and he was skipping all along High St., but the others were stuck in a food coma that slowed them. Lily was at the back, walking with Kenna behind Lysander and Harper.

"See, that wasn't so bad, was it?" asked Kenna once Lysander was far enough ahead not to overhear.

Lily grinned and said, "No, it wasn't bad at all."

They were about to cross the street when they came upon Woolworths and Harper announced that she had to grab something from her flat. Lily was shocked to see that "her flat" also happened to sit right above Woolworths, and it didn't take long to realize that Erick wasn't Lysander's only roommate.

Back in October, Lily had woken up in Lysander's room after a full moon, but only Lysander had been in that morning. She vaguely remembered seeing a blurrier version of Harper before she'd blacked out that night, but at the time she hadn't even known where she was, let alone whom she was with.

As the others nodded to Harper and Harper ran inside, Lily stomped toward Lysander, ignoring Kenna's knowing protests. They were on the other side of the street when she caught up, pricked him on the shoulder and said, "You _live _with her?"

"Ow, blimey, you're strong," he mumbled before adding, "Who, Harper? Yeah, she kind of just moved in one day. She's in James's room."

"You gave James's room to _her?"_ asked Lily.

Lysander shrugged, dumbfounded.

A few meters ahead of them, Evey had just opened the heavy door to what was labeled as a smelly seafood restaurant. Scoffing at Lysander, Lily walked away from him and into the pub, Kenna right on her heels.

Lily had never been in a pub before. She'd imagined what they looked like loads of times, primarily from descriptions James and Lysander had given her when she was little, and of course she'd tasted her fair share of their products, but this afternoon was her first actual bar experience. So far, she hated it.

Slumping herself on a stool at the wooden bar and staring longingly at the array of beverage choices before her, Lily told pretending barmaid Kenna, "Get me a firewhiskey, hot as you can make it."

The shot glass Kenna slid across the table to Lily was literally on fire, but it was only magic, so Lily poured it down her throat without hesitating. "Another!" she said, slamming the glass down just as Lysander took a seat beside her.

"Lily, come on," he pleaded.

"Come on what?" she asked. She was testing him, as he was her, and she desperately hoped that he would pass.

When Kenna passed Lily the second shot, Lysander put his hand over it, straight through its flames, and said, "Don't."

He failed.

Lily glared at him, well aware of what she was doing – crushing him and hurting him and flooding him – took the shot glass, and said, "I'm not your little sister." She would have walked away, too, but she'd been here first.

Still, she was thankful when all the boys had gotten their beers and Grady suggested a Magpies pool tournament, leaving Lily alone at the bar with the Meyer sisters on its other side. Harper returned a few minutes later, and she took the seat Lysander had been in but didn't order a drink.

Evey gave her a glass of water and Harper thanked her, asking with concern, "You all right, Evey? You were quiet at lunch."

Both Kenna and Evey were now leaning against the sink on the back wall as it magically washed a group of very large dirty cups. Evey was looking at the padded floor and Harper was looking at the bruise on her neck. "I'm fine," said Evey, "it's just been a long weekend."

Harper nodded. "Better now that your sister's here, though, right?" she said after an awkward silence. "And what a coincidence that you and Lily are such close friends, Kenna."

"Yeah," said Kenna, "And what a coincidence that you and Lysander are also so close."

"Er, I suppose," said Harper, stuck between the stares of Kenna and Lily on either side.

Suddenly curious once more, Evey asked, "Are you and Lysander getting on better now then, Harper? Because, you know, it's about time you moved on-"

"_Stop _talking before I say the same to you," Harper spat before Evey could finish.

Kenna raised an eyebrow at Lily and Lily knew that they were both thinking the same thing: whatever, or _who_ever, Harper needed to move on from didn't matter; what mattered was that she was available to move in the first place. Lily turned around and spotted Grady walking toward the bar with empty glasses to fill, then winked at Kenna.

"Biggest cups you've got this time," said Grady to Evey, furrowing his brows suggestively.

"What makes you think I've got any cups bigger than the ones you just used?" asked Evey, wiping off the beer Grady had spilled on the counter.

"Oh, I think the cups are just one of many secrets you're currently failing to hide from me," said Grady as he squeezed himself between Lily and Harper and leaned his whole body across the bar. "Just like I know that you have been waiting for me to challenge you to pool, and now that I've whooped Scamander's ass out of the running, there's an open spot."

Lily also leaned forward at that in hopes to send Kenna a look of warning, but Kenna was two steps ahead of her. She was already telling Grady, "No, my sister's the only responsible one here; she needs to tend the bar. You should play with Harper. That way, you'll keep it in the Magpies family."

Disappointed but quickly accepting, Grady turned to Harper and shrugged, asking, "You up for shooting some balls, Flying Fryer?"

"If they're yours, absolutely."

The two made their way over to the table where cheerleaders Pierre and Erick were already choosing sides, and Lily too decided she needed a break from the bar. After asking Evey where the loo was, she followed the directions and walked into a hallway lit with blue fluorescent lights that twinkled from the floor.

_"Lumos_," she whispered to give herself more light, practically screaming when her wand lit up and all she saw was Lysander's face less than a meter away from her.

"Sorry," he said, arms up in surrender. "I didn't mean to scare you. I just thought we should talk."

"Oh yeah?" said Lily. "What do you want to talk about? You want to talk about my drinking, tell me that I should stop before I wind up in the hospital again? You want to talk about all of our childhood memories, reminisce on all the times you played tag with my brothers and left me to watch on the sidelines? Or do you want to talk about the gorgeous Quidditch star who also happens to be your flatmate?"

Lysander was smiling. He was _just_ smiling. He didn't say anything, he didn't do anything, he didn't even move. He just smiled.

"Oi!" Lily yelled. "Say something, you tosser!"

As his smile faded, Lily prepared herself to be yelled at, to be chastised and humiliated and disciplined like she had been by her brothers so many times before. She even shut her eyes, not wanting to look at this boy she liked as he tore her apart, and so she didn't see him lean forward, didn't see him grab her face in his hands, didn't see him close his own eyes and kiss her.

Lily stumbled backward and through the bathroom door she'd forgotten to close until her backside met the sink and Lysander helped to lift her onto its rim. She was nearly as tall as him this way, but she was less stable than ever, so she found herself wrapping her legs around his waist so that he could hold her steady.

His lips tasted better than her spicy Indian food had, better even than firewhiskey. They tasted like sea salt and chimney smoke and crispy cold air. A chill passed through her as he willed her mouth to open wider, and when Lily realized she had no idea what she was doing, she pulled her lips away and said, "I thought you wanted to talk."

The light of her wand had long gone out by now, so she couldn't see Lysander's hungry eyes when he said, "I did, but then I lost focus. You're ridiculously hot when you're jealous."

Lily let out a cool breath against Lysander's neck and said, "That doesn't sound like something you'd say to your little sister."

"No, it doesn't," said Lysander, breathing cool air on Lily's neck now. "I guess that's why I said it to you and not to Harper."

This time, Lily decided, he had passed with flying colors. Just so as not to ruin this seemingly perfect moment, she kissed his jawbone and said after biting gently on his soft skin, "We can stop talking now."

"Yeah?" asked Lysander, his lips tantalizingly close to hers.

"Yeah," Lily nodded before giving in and opening her mouth as wide as it would go.

They snogged for what must have been hours, kissing until they could barely breathe. They were still catching their breaths when Pierre came barging into the bathroom and kindly kicked them out. They walked hand-in-hand back to the bar, where no one noticed how flushed they were thanks to their own inebriation.

Grady, Erick, Harper, and Kenna were seated together at a booth in the far corner, Evey at the bar speaking seriously with an older man Lily didn't recognize. Grady was screaming as he took a shot of something, and Harper was banging her fist on the table and saying, clearly the only one still sober, "I demand a re-match, and on something that requires a bit more exertion than a simple game of pool, please."

"I'm open to suggestions," said Grady, his over-exaggerated gesticulation causing Kenna to keel over in laughter.

"All right," Harper said, crossing her arms against her chest. "I can run the steps of an entire stadium in under half an hour. I challenge _you_ to beat me."

Lily and Lysander had reached the booth by now, and without even looking at each other, they said in unison, "Did someone say _challenge?"_

* * *

"All right, people, listen up," said Pierre with his deep, strong voice. "You start and end on the closest flight to the locker room. Your route is a zig-zag; you must both ascend and descend every step in the stadium, without exception. You may stop as many times as you like, but you may not interfere with any other racer. I will both watch and time for the winner."

Lysander was stretching his shins against the first step of the Montrose Magpies Quidditch stadium, preparing himself for the race. Lily jumped next to him to keep warm, wearing the same clothes she'd had on in the Meyer Lemon since they'd come straight from there, minus her coat. Harper had changed into sweatpants and a jumper and wasn't even shivering on his other side, but both Grady and Erick were shaking their arms and heads sporadically. Kenna looked the coldest of all, her petite frame trembling like a baby before a boggart as the sun set and took every last speck of warmth with it.

"On your marks," said Pierre from behind the line-up, "get set, _GO!"_

Lysander leapt from the frozen grass to gain the head start, running three steps at a time up the first row of bleachers in order to separate himself from the pack. He was in the lead and sweating when he reached the top, quickly turning around and sprinting back down.

Erick was the first one he ran into, only a few steps from the top. He was followed by Grady and Harper, who were slowing each other down with their constant jabbing, and Kenna was on their tail. Lysander was halfway down when he noticed that he had yet to pass Lily, and it wasn't until he reached the grass again and had to turn to move to the second row that he saw her, ahead of Erick and only a few steps behind himself.

"How are you doing this?" he asked, bounding up the next flight only two steps at a time, same as Lily.

"All those times you put me on the sidelines means you never noticed how fast I was!" she called after him, though his lead was increasing as she used her energy to talk rather than run.

Lysander remembered playing games of magical tag and Quidditch with James and Teddy and Al and Lorcan in Godric's Hollow when they were all much younger. It was true that the boys had rarely invited Lily to play with them, but that hadn't been because of her gender; it had been because of her age.

Now, her age was what propelled her, because while Lysander's teammates were beginning to get older and were surely weakened by their difficult training schedule, Lily was spry as could be even when tipsy. Then again, she was also a werewolf.

"You sure your new wolf genes aren't putting you at an advantage?" asked Lysander as they reached the top, stopping momentarily to catch his breath.

Lily walked the final five steps to meet him. "I passed clearance, didn't I?" she joked, beginning her descent before he did. Together, they flew by a consistently paced Erick, a speeding Harper and Kenna, and a rather pale-faced Grady bringing up the rear.

Over the next few flights, Grady fell out of the race and ended up vomiting over the tower fence. Kenna was beginning to slow down when they reached the halfway point, having to walk on most of her ascents but regaining time when she sprinted on the descents. The gap between Lily and Erick had narrowed, as had the one between Erick and Harper, so the race would be a close call amongst the four frontrunners.

"What do you say we shake off these coattail riders?" Lily asked Lysander as they rounded a corner and began yet another endless descent. Normally, the racers would descend slowly in order to regulate their breathing from the run up, but as Kenna was proving, fast descents could make a world of difference, especially with legs like Lysander's.

Without agreeing, Lysander sped up so much that he almost fell when he reached level ground once more and had to slow down to conquer the next flight. He and Lily kept the pace up for three more flights, their lead growing so large that by the time their opponents were running up a new flight, they were running up the next one over.

They were on their fourth sprinted descent, only one flight away from the locker room that would act as their finish line, when Lily screamed from a few step above Lysander. Though he couldn't stop right away thanks to the inertia locked in his legs, Lysander willed his body to slow and ran back up to find Lily clinging to the railing and hopping in place.

"What's wrong?" he asked between breaths, worried Lily may have broken something.

"My ankle," she seethed. "It's okay; I think it's just twisted. Go on, go win the race."

Lysander laughed, having already forgotten about the race in the midst of Lily's slip. "I don't care about that," he said, offering her a hand. "Let me help you."

She smiled and his heart skipped a beat, so he lost focus when she ran past him, her ankles both straight as could be.

"You did _not_ just cry wolf on me!" he yelled after her, taking off a moment too late. Lily was ascending the next flight already; there was no way he could catch her now.

As they passed each other for the final time, Lily on her last descent and Lysander nearing the top, she called at him, "What can I say? It's your own fault you let your savior complex get to you!"

Lily won the race in just under twenty-four minutes, Lysander coming in ten seconds after as the first loser. Erick, Harper, and Kenna were only minutes behind, and Grady had forfeited and made his way back to the pitch at his own snail's pace.

"I don't know about the rest of you," said Kenna as they all hobbled off the pitch, "but I actually feel like I need to cool down after that."

"Ya," said Erick, "I tink I vill run home and take a cold shower." He was off before anyone could stop him, though Lily had a much better idea than a cold shower.

"Maybe we should all do a polar plunge in the ocean," she said, and Lysander grinned at the idea.

"Or in a pool," he said, and suddenly he and his remaining teammates, as well as Lily and Kenna, were running down to the river and across the bridge to the Cavendish mansion, whose lights were off for the night and whose heated swimming pool sat peacefully in a backyard overlooking the basin.

Everyone was in a complete frenzy, either from the alcohol or adrenaline or both, as they sprinted for the pool. Grady was pulling off layers of clothing with every step so that when he was finally close enough to cannonball, he also happened to be stark naked. The others waited to undress until they were on the pool deck, though Pierre jumped in fully clothed and splashed the whole yard. Harper went in next in just her undergarments, followed shortly by Kenna.

It was a new moon, so the only light in the sky came from the stars as Lysander watched Lily stand frozen in her knickers, hesitating to peel off her shirt. He had seen her stomach last month when Ilana had examined it at St. Mungo's. There wasn't any bit of belly fat for Lily to hide, but there were scars. Ilana had presumed that Lily must have scratched herself while in werewolf form, because the scars were too wide and too deep to have come from any normal animal. This surely made Lily even more self-conscious about them, but Lysander had only thought that their depth showed how strong that werewolf was, and therefore how strong _Lily_ was. The scars were a part of her, just like her wolf was, and much like her bursting heart, he didn't want her to keep the animal caged inside.

Taking a step toward her, Lysander told Lily, "You don't have to hide here. Not from them. Not from me."

"I know," she nodded, "but would it be all right if I hid anyway, at least for now?"

"Of course," said Lysander, and when he was sure that she was comfortable, he scooped her up so that her upper body hung over his shoulder and threw her into the pool, diving in right after.

The water felt simultaneously hot and cold as it flowed through him from all directions. It gave his sweat a refreshing chill, but it also burned the parts of him that had been most exposed to the winter's night – his hair, his fingers, his toes. It was an incredible feeling, like being in two places at once or like kissing someone whose lips were frozen but whose tongue was on fire.

Right on cue, Lysander found Lily while they were still underwater and his senses were heightened even further by the exact kiss he'd been longing for. Just like in the bathroom at the Meyer Lemon, he would have stayed here with her in the water if he hadn't needed to breathe so badly. They were both sad to surface, but their friends were ready and waiting to dunk them under once more.

The pool games continued and evolved throughout the night, with breath-holding dares and strip tag and overly honest late-night conversations. Lily and Lysander never left each other's side, literally attached when they dominated five rounds of paired wrestling. Lily sat high on Lysander's shoulders, Harper flailed atop Grady, and Kenna sat slow but steady on the massive Pierre. Lily would lunge for the girls' exposed mid-sections and Lysander would trip the boys from below, leaving the other pairs to fall back into the water, screaming as they splashed.

No one paid much mind to the noise they were making, so Lysander wasn't sure how long they all continued to scream and shout before they noticed the same little girl he'd seen on the beach standing on the pool deck looking down at them. Harper was the first to spot her, having just surfaced from a recent fall with Grady and going still as a post when her eyes met the girl's.

Harper was also the first to leave, jumping out of the water without a word and grabbing her clothes mid-run. The others didn't move until they heard a voice call from inside the house's open backdoor, "TINDER, WHERE ARE YOU?"

"Go," Lysander said to Lily, and then to everyone, "GO!"

He and Lily pulled themselves onto the deck next, and once they each had their clothes in one hand, Lysander grabbed Lily's free hand with his and led her in a run back through town. He would have slowed to ask her if she needed to wait for her friend, but he and Lily were barefoot and so they had to continue running just to escape the icy ground.

When they made it to Lysander's flat, they were both exhausted. Harper was coming out of a steaming shower as the two leaned against the front door, panting and whispering so as not to wake Erick, who was asleep on the nearby sofa. Their energy was long gone at this point, but they managed to make the long walk down the hallway to Lysander's bedroom. He left Lily there to search the hall closet for a towel he could lend her, but when he returned, she was fast asleep on his unmade bed. Lysander didn't think twice before joining her there.

* * *

Lysander woke the next morning an hour before Lily did, which gave him time to shower and find her some warm clothes to wear. He rummaged through his closet and laid out an old grey sweatshirt that would probably go down to her knees, as well as an equally baggy pair of pants, on his bed. She'd shivered throughout the night, even with James's old Gryffindor blanket and Lysander's arms wrapped around her.

When she started to stir, he took a seat on the bed's edge and waited for her eyes to open. "Hi," he said when they finally did.

"Hi," she said in the middle of a yawn. Then she stretched and pulled herself to a sitting position so that both their backs were leaning against the wall. Her hair was scraggly from sleep, looking windblown and wild. Her make-up was smudged and smeared in blotches across her face. Her eyes were shining.

He leaned in and kissed her lightly on the lips, tasting a mixture of chlorine and alcohol in her mouth, and asked, "Would you like to spend the day with me?"

"What, like, on a date?" she raised her eyebrows.

"A day date, yes," said Lysander. "I was thinking we could go for a walk on the beach and then grab some food before you have to get back to Hogwarts. Just the two of us this time."

Lily smiled and said, "I'd quite like that."

After she'd gotten ready, Lily and Lysander headed out, declining Harper's generous offer of freshly burnt toast as they passed through the kitchen. They went to the harbor-side of the beach, where all the houseboats rocked along the shore with the waves, and walked for an hour on the coarsely snowy sand. Lily picked up tiny pieces of sea glass to give to Roxanne and Lysander attempted to skip stones on the white caps that had turned to ice caps overnight.

Eventually, they made it to the Scurdie Ness, and Lysander led Lily up its familiar spiral staircase to the top floor deck, which sat just below the giant spinning light. She leaned over the railing and breathed in deeply as he joined her and wrapped James's blanket around the both of them.

"Can I ask you something?" said Lily, her forehead nuzzled in the crook of his shoulder.

"Shoot," he said.

"What are we?"

Lysander hadn't expected this question, so he didn't have an answer prepared. He also had no idea what answer she wanted from him, or what label she was hoping he'd put on their relationship – friend, girlfriend, anything other than sister? Rather than think only of what she might want him to say, Lysander focused on the feeling of his heart thumping against his chest. As he looked out over the water that was crashing through its cage of ice the same way his heart had practically broken his ribs over these past two weeks, these past _many_ weeks if he was being honest, he thought about her fire. Each time he kissed her, he felt it flowing through his every cell, even the angry ones, _especially_ the angry ones. And he let it. He let the fire burn him and balm him and sear him and settle him and shatter him and shelter him, over and over again.

So the only thing he could think of to say, because it was the only truth he wished to believe, was, "We're together."

* * *

_**Note: **Thanks for reading, and hopefully that was a nice break from the angst that this story is usually filled with! How are you guys liking the Lily/Lysander relationship so far? Also, any favorite Magpies character(s) now that they're all being fleshed out more? Let me know in a review! I love hearing from each and every one of you._

_I am going to give myself another two weeks for the next update, because I'm moving houses at the end of this week, but I'll try to finish the chapter as soon as possible. Look for spoilers on my profile, or ask for them in a review (I love giving them, haha). :)_

_-Hailey_


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